To Love Life Again
by Dayang Lucilla
Summary: Amid the hills and the romantic whispering of the mountain breeze and the sea, in the handsome seaside village of Ardmore, someone is waiting for Hermione. Someone waiting for his own return to life. Someone named Andrei MacElroy, or so he claims... D/Hr
1. Existing

_**Existing…

* * *

**_

_This_ was Ireland, not the busy city of Dublin or the pleasant buzz of Waterford, but these verdant hills and broody cliffs descending to cerulean waters; the Ireland of legends, myths, music and magic. It was easy to forget here, yes, she could see that now.

Parents were wise creatures, weren't they?

But at the moment, Hermione couldn't believe that. Even Mrs Weasley, who had become a second mother to her.

How _could_ they send her here?

How could they think this quiet wild paradise of hills would make her forget about Ron? You more easily did that when you were up to your neck in paperwork about Dark wizards, right? Or when you were filing treasure after treasure for the bank. Or when you were investigating file after file of unusual Charm accidents for the hospital. Or all those at the same time. When you did all that plus take care of an ailing cat, you simply didn't have room for your mind to think about the fiancé you'd lost five years ago.

"Grief is like a drunken house guest, always coming back for one last goodbye hug."

She'd read that in "Bag of Bones", a book by an American Muggle, Stephen King. Sitting here, driving through the little village of Ardmore, looking for her grandmother's cottage through a mist of tears, Hermione nodded her head as if saluting Mr King for his brevity. How true it was. Grief never did leave her.

As though sympathizing with her, Ireland's sky opened up and let pour.

"How nice," Hermione murmured to Crookshanks, who sat beside her on the passenger seat. She wiped her eyes and then stroked the cat. "Now if I don't get lost—if I'm not already—I'll likely end up driving over a cliff, and voila! I'll be with Ron."

Crookshanks let out a short imrowl,/i disapproving her sarcasm. Hermione smirked at him, scratched his ears one last time and flicked on the wipers. She squinted and eased the car along on the street.

She saw cottages, like flowers standing together, quaint and pretty. She saw shops, a little post office and a bank. She was in Muggle Ireland, where her mother's mother grew up. Harry and Ginny had honeymooned here; right at the cottage Hermione's grandmother had left. And now it was her turn for a vacation. But she'd only gone here to make her parents and Mrs Weasley happy and to stop Ginny from badgering her to take time off from work.

_"What am I going to do there?"_

_ "Nothing. Simply nothing. You've been doing too much; try to be a hermitess for a change. You'll love it there. It was so beautiful…"_

_ "Do you want to come with me?" she had asked, keeping a straight face, knowing what Ginny would answer._

_ "Don't be silly. Besides, even if Harry allowed me to go, I'm always sick nowadays."_

_ "Oh, Ginny, are you—?"_

_ "Yes, I think I am." They squealed and hugged. "So go on to Ireland and just take a break. When you get back, you'll baby-sit."_

That had sounded wonderful. She packed her bags (No, Ginny actually did). She'd hole up here for the whole six months of her sabbatical, and then return. Just that. She made no plans of what she'd do here (they had forbidden her to), except read. Yes, that would be nice. Three quarters of what she packed were books she had bought but didn't get the chance to gobble. She smiled at the thought of what Ron would say to that. And then she grimaced.

"He's dead, Hermione. Killed by Bellatrix. It wasn't your fault. At least you were both happy before he died. Engaged, right? And he'd be disgusted with you if you don't get on with life. So don't mop around again. Get yourself together."

She nodded again. She had mastered that mantra for the past five years. Only that and routine had kept her from rotting away in some armchair.

She stopped the car.

The rain was now falling in sheets and if she continued to drive, she might hit something or somebody or go right down a cliff. She could make out hedgerows to her right, and to her left, there was nothing, just the rain and the sound of the surf. She wasn't even sure if she was still in Ardmore or had already begun climbing to Faerie Hill, the hill where her cottage was waiting. Her mom had cautioned her not to venture there alone. She was to stop at MacElroy's, the inn owned by some of their far kin, and stay there for the night if she arrived late. And then the next morning, one of the MacElroys could accompany her to Faerie Hill. It seemed odd that Harry and Ginny didn't just give her precise directions to the cottage. But then, of course, Hermione doubted if they even remembered MacElroy's, much less the way to the cottage. They had been in their honeymoon after all, Hermione couldn't help smiling.

The smile didn't reach her eyes, though. No one had been unfeeling enough to say so, but Hermione now was only a shadow of Hermione before when there was still a Ronald Weasley walking and talking and grinning in the Wizarding world. She looked at herself in her rearview mirror. She looked the way anyone would look after crossing the sea (she'd gone by Muggle air transport) and driving in the rain (she didn't want to Apparate either), all the while revisiting memories in her mind. Happy memories tainted otherwise by the fact that that was all they could be—memories.

She considered just cruising along until the wheels of her rental Volvo just left solid ground and flew through space.

iHermione Granger Died of Car Accident in Muggle Ireland/i

It would be an odd obituary. And embarrassing. She survived the Dark War only to fall down a cliff. She could almost see Ron chiding her in the afterlife. She grinned and grimaced again. Merlin, she was perhaps going mad.

She took her wand from the inside pocket of her coat.

"MacElroy's. _Point me_."

Her wand swiveled and pointed to her right.

"Oh, is this it?" She looked at the hedgerow.

She eased the car out of PARK and crawled forward, squinting through the rain at her right. She saw a break and turned in with a sigh of relief.

She had to visit a bathroom rather badly. She grimaced again.

Her umbrella was packed in one of her suitcases. Another grimace.

She looked around the car for something she could transfigure and came upon the plastic map in the well beneath the emergency break.

"Nice umbrella you got there, colleen." She could almost hear it, as she pointed her wand at the green map.

"I'll be right back, Crookshanks. No use taking you out in the wet if this isn't even MacElroy's. I just need to pee."

She opened her car door, shook open the map umbrella and ducked under it. The rain was starting to amaze her. It fell thick but quietly, not raging. Just the sort of rain that would turn the world into a burst of colors the next day. It was February twenty-eighth, and spring was already full steam ahead in Ireland as always.

Something rattled in the wind. Hermione jumped and yelped and looked in amazement at the little building beside her. If she wasn't so neurotic these days she would have sworn it appeared out of nowhere. The sign that swung daintily by the door said The Green Dragon. The carved and painted dragon eyed her with majestic hauteur.

Hermione squared her shoulders, took hold of the door latch which was also a carved dragon, and went in. At least, she could ask for directions. At most, she could ask to use the loo.

"Well, bless my soul. Who might this fair maiden be, come out of this fine drizzle and into The Green Dragon?"

Hermione looked at the old man behind the bar and couldn't help smile.

If he had a long beard and wasn't so round, he would have reminded her of Dumbledore. He did so anyway, with his twinkling blue eyes. His hair was brown and as bushy as hers, silver at the roots by the side of his ears. He wore a purple apron embroidered richly in green with Chinese dragons, their long bodies and tails interlocking and forming intricate knots.

"Are you lost then, my dear?"

Hermione gave herself an inward shake and approached nearer the bar. There were no other customers, the booths and tables were all empty, and for that she was glad. "Oh no, I'm not lost—well, I'm looking for MacElroy's and—"

The blue eyes twinkled more at the mention of MacElroy's. "Are you, now? It seems only yesterday when another such as you was looking for it. You two are very much alike. Would you like a drink, mavourneen? And will you tell old Blenkinsop Waterbut your pretty name, please?"

"Oh, I'm sorry, Mr Waterbut—my name is Hermione Granger." He nodded; he was already fixing her a drink. It was, Hermione saw, hot butterbeer with lemon and cream. He was a wizard. Harry and Ginny had not mentioned The Green Dragon, had they?

"And where are you coming from, and what is your business with MacElroy's? Not prying, my colleen, just friendly chit-chat. There, please to drink your sour buttercream, it will do you good."

"They're far kin of mine, though we haven't met before." Hermione sipped her drink. It warmed her insides apart from being maddeningly delicious. "I come from England, here to stay at Faerie Hill cottage for a while. The MacElroys are supposed to bring me there."

"Faerie Hill Cottage! Are you related to Maude Alice?"

"Maude Alice Fitzgerald, yes, she was my grandmother."

"Ah, _your grandmother_. Well, I wonder if you are sweet like her, and warm like her and…_wise_ like her."

"You knew my grandmother?" Hermione was stirred that her beloved grandmother, her beloved Muggle grandmother, had been friends with a wizard.

"Why, yes, we were friends. Quite close friends. How could we not be, when one night when she met me outside the door, she told me I would marry a lass of my own kind, with fair hair and gray eyes? And there was my Lilias, with her fair hair and gray eyes, and we had many lovely chiliads together before…before this pub was bestowed upon my hands."

Hermione was dumbfounded. She looked at her companion. He twinkled at her, seemingly aware of what she was thinking, and amused by it. iChiliads./i A chiliad was a thousand years. How oddly he spoke.

"The good people whispered to Maude Alice's ears. That's why I'm not surprised now that her kin is a witch. And you being her kin, the good people might also whisper to you. When they do, see that you listen."

Hermione just nodded, though her brain reeled. She didn't even notice that her glass was full again. She had sipped it to half while Mr Waterbut talked, but now she drank it to half again. Her grandmother had been a Seer. She was drinking in a Wizarding pub and talking with a…well, he must be a wizard—she could think of no other being who could live _chiliads._ And she thought she will have to hide her wand while here.

What else would she find?

"You have expressive eyes, Hermione, just like your grandmother. How are you? I've heard of your name, of course. You have a fame that would always precede you just as my belly always precedes me." His eyes watched Hermione closely and radiated warm sympathy. "How are you, mavourneen?"

Hermione looked away. He wanted to talk about Ron, and she couldn't. She couldn't. Still. She smiled at the diamond-shaped panes of the window, running with soft rain that looked like tears. "I'm alright, Mr Waterbut. The war's over, and—and I could ask for nothing more, except—can I use your loo?"

"Certainly, certainly, my dear." He raised a flap at one end of the bar and came around and put an arm around her shoulder, gave her a little squeeze. "Through here."

Hermione thought he would go right in with her to the little powder room. But he opened the door, turned on the light and nudged her in gently.

Hermione took several deep breaths and sank onto the cushioned toilet seat, biting her lip and wishing she had her sour buttercream there to drown her persistent tears. They were pushing up her throat and out her eyes again.

When she felt alright as what her 'alright' was nowadays, she stood up and straightened her hair and clothes. She looked at her reflection in the carved mirror in the wall and grimaced. "I should go to bed."

"Yes, dear. Sometimes, it's the best and easiest escape," her mirror replied.

Hermione scowled. "I'm not escaping!" she huffed. Without giving the mirror a chance to answer, she went out the door.

Mr Waterbut was waiting for her at one of the tables, drinking a small firewhiskey. He stood up when she saw her. "The rain has stopped. No saying it won't start again, though. MacElroy's is just straight up this road, my dear."

"Thank you very much, Mr Waterbut. I was refreshed." Hermione opened her purse to pay for her drink, but Mr Waterbut took hold of her hands and closed her purse.

"The drink's on the house. For welcome," he said with a smile.

"Thank you," Hermione said again. And because he reminded her of Dumbledore, and was a completely charming old man besides, she kissed him on his wrinkled cheek. His eyes danced merrily. Before Hermione could approach the door, he put a hand on her shoulder.

"For some reason, we all tend to hang on to something we know we have to let go of. It's like…we're afraid to lose something we don't really have. We think we'd rather take that, rather than have absolutely nothing…But Hermione, the truth is this, to have something halfway is even more torturous than not having it at all."

Hermione stared at him. And then she was startled to feel tears down her cheeks. She brushed them away hastily and nodded at the old man, muttering a goodbye, or maybe she only muttered gibberish; she couldn't tell, and she didn't care. It was only when Mr Waterbut touched her again on the shoulder that she realized she had rushed to the loo instead of to the door.

"Oh," she muttered, and then grinned to cover her mortification. Mr Waterbut laughed out loud. "Don't go running away again, Hermione, you might end up somewhere nastier than a loo."

His laughter was infectious. In spite of her previous confusion, Hermione laughed. They went on laughing as he walked her to the door.

"Goodbye, Mr Waterbut, and thank you again. For rescuing me from the loo, too."

"See that you come back, mavourneen."

Hermione smiled. Her vacation wouldn't be exclusive to reading, after all. She could spend time with this old man, her grandmother's friend. He jangled her nerves with his words awhile ago, but she felt comforted at the same time. She'd been rocking in a dinghy for so long. Now she might have found a harbor.

"I will."

* * *

She walked slowly toward the dark shape of the building. The ground rose, and she was glad of the pebbles scattered underneath her feet. Otherwise she'd be sliding in slush for certain.

Not a second had passed after she thought this when someone grabbed her around the waist. Her feet left the ground momentarily, but before she could scream, she bumped against a little woolen blue bundle whence a small red head peeped.

_"Are you alright?"_

She was disoriented, the umbrella dropped to her feet and bobbed like a giant green poppy. She looked up at the man who had grabbed her. His blonde hair was dripping, and there was panic in his gray eyes.

"I—yes…thank you. I'm looking for MacElroy's. Why did you—"

"I'm Andrei MacElroy, and it seems you've found us. But you were walking to the cliff, Hermione, did you know that?"

"What? I—" Why was he looking at her like that? "Of course, I didn't know. If I did, I wouldn't be walking this way—" Did he call her by her name? She was about to ask when, suddenly uncomfortable looking straight to his gray eyes, she looked down, and caught sight of the little redhead again. "Oh goodness, why did you bring your baby out?"

"Well, he climbs up and out of his crib if he has a mind to, and there was no one in the house to leave him to, and here you were about to walk to your death, so I really had no choice but to grab him and run and grab you, too."

"Won't he be ill?" Unconsciously, she had moved closer and was tugging at the baby's woolen hood to make sure it covered him.

"No, no, Ron's hardy. iI'm/i the one likely to catch ague."

Hermione faintly registered his grouse but gasped at his first words.

_"Ron?"_

"Yes, yes. Stop staring like a goose. Come on then, to the house—"

She stared at the baby with his fluff of copper hair. What kind of coincidence was this? Coming to Ireland and being rescued from a cliff by a man with a baby named Ron, a baby with red hair and blue eyes like Ron?

She stumbled upon a step, jolting her back to reality, and she realized they were already at the door of MacElroy's. She tore her eyes away from little Ron.

"I—I left my cat in the car."

"He's snug and dry then, and we're not," the man said wryly. What was his name again? And very grumpy for an Irishman. "Go inside. I'll go and get him."

Hermione nodded, still shaken. And then, as if Merlin was intent on turning not just her legs to jelly, the man gave her the blue bundle.

"Here, hold Ron for me for a second."

He went back out in the rain, leaving her holding the gurgling, bright-eyed baby. Her heart was drumming so hard in her chest she was amazed it didn't scare him. No, he just looked at her and then grabbed a lock of her hair.

"You're a sweetie," she chuckled. "You're aptly named."

She kissed him, and for the first time in five years, her heart felt light.

* * *

He'd been expecting her, so his shock was long past even before she boarded the Muggle plane to Dublin—except if you counted his jolt when he saw her walking under the map umbrella to the bluff. He thought she was—no, that was ridiculous. When he told her where she'd been heading she looked surprised enough for it to be a lie. Still, he knew she took Ron Weasley's death hard. Harry and Ginny had told him as much when they met here. He believed it right after he saw her face.

He knew that look, because he himself still wore it at times.

That look came from loss, sorrow, guilt.

All of which he thought he had more license to feel than she had.

After all, she had just lost a loved one, and through no fault of her own.

While he…he had killed his own aunt, had forsaken his own parents, and had brought about the death of Dumbledore (Not in that order. But in that order of egregiousness (Killing Bellatrix was least of his sins. The harridan had had it coming to her).

His chest tightened at the thought, even now, six years later.

But like Hermione, he had done all he could to bury the past. She immersed herself into work; he immersed himself into _family._

He laughed at himself sometimes, but that was really it. It was the thing he'd lacked all his life. Just being with people—really ibeing with/i them, not treating them as inferior or bossing them around, but accepting them and being accepted in return, whether or not he had money and status _(what status now? Haha…)._ The Order gave it to him. First, at Headquarters after they found him, and then, here in Ireland, after they'd won the war.

Someone could have knocked him over with a quill when he discovered that his grandfather Abraxas had an uncle who was a Squib. A Squib immediately disowned when he had not received a letter from Hogwarts. He had been Obliviated, given the name MacElroy, and transplanted here in the fishing village of Ardmore. True to his Malfoy blood though, he had prospered, and had passed down this noble pub and inn from son to son.

Five years ago, with a little memory charm as well, another Malfoy had been welcomed in Ardmore by Patricia MacElroy Duffy and her daughter and son-in-law, Kathy and Jack Ryan. They were glad _cousin Andrei_ had come, because as long as there was a MacElroy in Ardmore, the pub would continue its legacy and the sea would not lose its bounty.

That was his story. And if things went as Harry and Ginny had planned—they couldn't be more blatant at their ridiculous matchmaking scheme—Hermione might be pleased to hear it. Pleased to the point of giggling and gawking at him for seeking and living with his Squib relations. He shook his head. No, the Hermione Granger he knew wouldn't actually do that. She'd go to her room first, certainly. He need not worry of mortification.

He looked around. When he was sure no one was looking, he brought out his wand and summoned the cat and Hermione's luggage. The cat came yowling out of the car door, but immediately quieted when he clutched it gently to his chest. The three matching burgundy suitcases landed neatly side-by-side at his feet. Too neatly, in fact, that he wondered if they were charmed to act that way. How exactly like Hermione Granger. He smirked. Ron – probably 'little Ron' to her—seemed to have gotten all her attention after she found out his name and that was just as well. At least, inside the pub there were divans and sofas ready if she fainted when she recognized him.

_Cut it out. Who are you, that you think you'd make her faint just at the sight of you?_

He opened the door cautiously…She was rocking with Ron, the little red head close to the brown one, and it took his breath away. Her eyes were closed, she looked peaceful— quite near beautiful. Whatever Harry and Ginny said, they had neglected to mention that Hermione had come a long way from being the bushy-haired, bossy know-it-all who glanced at him alternately suspiciously and pityingly while he lived with them at the Order Headquarters.

He didn't know how long he stood staring by the door, but he jumped and Hermione jumped when she saw him as she stood up at last from the rocker. Then she smiled and put a finger to her lips. He felt himself smiling back and watched her as she sort of glided over to the crib near the hearth. With more grace and expertise than he'd seen in either Aunt Patty or Kathy, she laid down the baby gently. She didn't move away, but just stood there and smiled at the sleeping infant. And then, as if she couldn't bear it anymore, she bent down and kissed the baby on the nose.

When she straightened up again, she turned to him grinning.

By this time, he had moved nearer the fire as well, trying to be as casual as could be, while the thought that now she could see him properly fluttered around in his stomach like a frenzied moth.

A second passed and it happened.

She didn't actually scream or faint, but she dropped onto the ottoman beside Ron's crib and clapped a hand to her mouth before more than a squeal came out.

It pleased him.

It meant she still remembers—

_"Draco Malfoy?"_

_

* * *

**A/N:** Please review! Anything you recognize belongs to JKR or has been originally used by Nora Roberts in her Irish Trilogy. Outside of place and character names, however, the rest is mine. _


	2. How to light a fire

_**How to Light a Fire…**_

_**

* * *

**_

"Oh, pardon?"

She stared at him, seeing for the first time.

The blonde hair. The gray eyes. Why didn't she recognize him right away?

He gave her that half-hearted, half-grumpy smile again and she knew why. If this was Malfoy, he had changed a lot. He looked…nice. And happy.

"I'm Andrei MacElroy, you're Hermione Granger, we've been expecting you," he said, plunking Crookshanks in the hearth rug. "And we're right glad we're having a Fitzgerald over here again. Aunt Patty, she just went to Waterford with Jack and Kathy for supplies."

All through this light speech of his she watched him suspiciously, but he busied himself with toweling Crrokshanks's fur and then he picked up her bags.

"They meant to go yesterday, but the doc Kathy was seeing for her sonogram didn't come in yesterday, so they decided to wait until today, to shoot two birds with one stone and all that. They meant to come back before you even had your feet in Dublin, but I guess this squall detained them, if not Aunt Patty's friend, Deidre."

He turned to her and only raised his eyebrows at the look she was giving him, a little bemused now, perhaps thinking she was just winded from the trip.

"I'll take these up to your room for you. Do you want to come up with me and see it and have your tea there, or do you intend to keep me and Ron company for awhile?"

"Andrei MacElroy?"

"Hmm? That's right."

"How long have you been here?"

"Five years this July."

Hermione gasped again. "And where were you before that?"

"Wicklow. My ma was from there, and she and me da were farmers until they both passed on in a car accident around June five years ago."

Hermione felt the heat in her face. "Oh. Oh, I'm sorry, I just—"

"That's alright, Hermione. You're asleep on your feet, come on to your bedroom."

There was a lilt in his voice when he said her name. Hermione almost wished he'd called her 'Granger', just so she could make certain—but what was she doing—insisting that this man who was ikin/i to her was _Draco Malfoy?_

If she wasn't so chagrined she could have laughed. She'd made a fool of herself. Of course, this wasn't Draco, however much the two men looked alike.

They climbed up the angled staircase to the third landing. They passed several doors before they stopped, at the very end of the hallway.

"You're not in the guests' floor. This used to be Kathy's room before she moved in with Jack down in the village. Aunt Patty figured you'd like the windows. One in the east, facing the hills; and one in the north, facing the sea."

He opened the door with a flourish. Hermione caught her breath.

Even in the dim glow of the lamp Andrei turned on, the room looked light. The furniture was all white French provincial, with charming pink quilts and throwovers obviously hand-made. Pink lace curtains charmed her to rush to the windows, and there she stood transfixed at the view of the rain falling on the hills and the hills seeming to embrace each drop. She stepped to face the other window. The ocean greeted her there, waving her welcome with its calm surf.

Andrei placed her bags at the foot of the wooden bed. At the sight of the thick pink and purple quilts, Hermione wanted nothing else but to drop there. But Andrei was looking at her, and she couldn't be rude twice.

"It's very lovely. And the view is…peaceful. I can't see how Grandma left this place."

"Well, she ran off with your grandfather is what I heard."

Hermione looked at him, smiling uncertainly. "Love makes us insane sometimes, you know. You don't have to be surly about it."

"Who's being surly? Sorry." He looked around the room, obviously aggrieved that he was the one stuck with welcoming her. Maybe his speech about the absence of the family and about the room had run out. Definitely very grumpy for an Irishman. Didn't Ginny say it would be easy to take a handsome Irish lover here and start a reckless affair? Hermione was safe from that, she smirked inwardly.

"I'm sorry again for my prying awhile ago, Andrei. And thanks for everything. You can leave me now, if you have something else to do."

He sighed and shook his head. "Aunt Patty and those two had better come home soon," he mumbled as he walked to the door.

"I can help you with—" Her breath caught in her throat before she was able to say it. "—with Ron. I can help you with him, if you like. He seems a very agreeable baby, anyway. Is this the first time everyone left him to you? How old is he?"

Andrei rolled his eyes and did smile again. "Six months last week. And now he's got another sibling on the way. You don't want to look at the list his mother left for me. Well, I'll just be downstairs if you need anything. Dinner should be ready in an hour."

He closed the door as if he was afraid the faintest click would bring her discomfort. Hermione shook her head. The man was a contradiction.

She filled her lungs with the heady air from the hills and the sea combined and lowered herself onto the bed, sinking her fingers in Crookshanks's fur. "I got here, lovie. I'm alright."

She closed her eyes.

* * *

"Merlin," Draco muttered. But it wasn't burning his thumb and forefinger on the kettle that made him mutter. It was Hermione Granger. Couldn't she just get on with life and erase that stupid lost-puppy look on her face? And where did Potter and his wife get the nerve to send her here, complicating his own life and making him—

What? Vulnerable? Concerned?

"Oh, _crap!_" He had poured the hot water on the uncovered soup tureen instead of the teapot. Ron giggled from his high chair. Draco stuck his tongue out at the toddler, making him wriggle more.

Draco took him and placed him on his playpen, to be safe. And then he went back to the kitchen, finished arranging the food in their right containers and picked up the tray. He knelt down by the playpen and whispered to Ron, "Stay put, now, I'm going to bring this up to our guest." Ron waved at Draco as if he understood before grabbing a rubber banana and cramming it into his mouth.

Sighing, Draco got up and mounted the stairs. Outside and on the roof, he could hear the rain. It calmed and vexed him at the same time. Merlin, he hadn't had these foul mood swings since he cut himself off from the Wizarding world and shed his old foul name.

He rapped softly on Hermione's door. He let a second pass and then opened it himself. He only realized what he had done when he was already inside the room—what if she'd been dressing? He slowly re-opened his eyes…The room was dark. The lamp had automatically turned itself off. He could hear the cat purring. He switched the lamp back on.

Curled around her cat like a fretful child around her doll, Hermione slept.

Draco snorted at himself inwardly and laid the tray on the bedside table. Why was he likening this witch—the cleverest witch in England—to helpless things? He looked at her and grimaced.

Even in her sleep, she wore that lost-puppy look (a phrase he'd gotten from Kathy._ "Jack, do you want my lost-puppy look before you get me that perfume?"_). A lost puppy. You'd think she didn't have Potter and her parents and all those Weasleys.

With a shake of his head, he tugged the extra folded coverlet from under the cat and spread it over Hermione.

* * *

He huddled deeper into his jacket. A mist cloaked Ardmore and he could feel its chill to his bones. Still, he needed this walk. Ron was asleep; he was never the kind of infant to wake before morning, so Draco snatched his chance. The rain had abated but solitary drops descended like soft bullets on his hair every now and then. Hermione was still sleeping it off, and that was good. In the morning, he would be able to ignore her—

"What time is it? Of course you know this place now, but you can't be too careful of our legendary bogs."

Draco unclenched his teeth and let out his breath. "What are you doing here? I thought I'd seen the last of you years ago."

"Well, life has a habit of jarring us every now and then, hasn't it?"

"iNone of your pretentious philosophy!/i Why can't you leave me alone? Was this your doing, sending Hermione Granger here?"

"You know her?"

"_You_ know her?"

"I will know her as I know you. Why don't you come inside? I could offer you drink."

"I don't want your drink. I want your departure from my life."

"Do you think I also enjoy this, bearing your irascibleness? Believe me, your wish is also my wish. I wish to depart, but it's as much my decision as your fate is yours."

"We've talked enough about fate, old man; it's an old, battered and foul subject." Draco turned away, only to gasp.

"You will never turn your back on me when I am speaking with you, for I am not an old iman,/i Draco Malfoy." Far in the distance, lightning flared and thunder cracked. And then, after some seconds in which the wind whispered loudly, all was calm again.

"Certainly I am not pleased that we met again, my dear boy. I was happy when I thought we had already parted. But then, here you are. Perhaps, I could make use of you—and Hermione Granger as well."

Draco stared into those blue eyes and emitted his own sparks. "Don't do that," he said through gritted teeth. "We've both been used enough." But his companion only smiled and patted his shoulder.

"I will say goodbye now. When you feel like talking, or listening—" The blue eyes twinkled in amusement. "—the Green Dragon is ever open."

* * *

Hermione opened her eyes and pulled the blanket around her tighter to her body. She was shivering, and starving. She brought up her arm and squinted at her wristwatch. It was five in the morning? She marveled at that. Never before had she slept this long.

She leaned over the bed when she heard Crookshanks lapping at something. Oh, how nice, someone had fixed him a bowl of milk. Andrei? Or had the other MacElroys arrived already?

She saw the tray of food on her bedside table first, and then as she tucked into it, noticed the dying embers in her fireplace. She groped for her wand from the inside pocket of her coat, found it, and in quick jabs locked the door, warmed her food and set fire roaring in the grate. She stowed her wand back inside her pocket. Crookshanks gave her an admonitory imrowl/i and then trotted over to the fire. She threw a muffin at him.

Slurping the savory chicken soup, she read her mental list of to-do's. First thing would be to write Ginny and her mom. And then she could—

_Hermione, I thought you're on holiday?_

Right. She could…well, she could go see Mr Waterbut again.

* * *

"No, my dear, they will be troubled that they have competition."

Hermione laughed with him. Of course she wouldn't tell the MacElroys about the Green Dragon, but she still asked Mr Waterbut. After all, he did know his grandmother. It made her wonder if the Muggles could access the pub. Apparently not. Just yet, though, she wouldn't press him about how he met her grandmother.

"If they're arriving today, who received you yesterday?" Mr Waterbut asked.

"Andrei MacElroy was there."

"Aah."

"Do you know him?"

Mr Waterbut shrugged and placed a tall glass of sour buttercream before her in her table. She sat by the window, watching the sunrise.

"He was odd," she told Mr Waterbut's back as he returned to the bar. "A little sullen. I hope the other MacElroys are cheerier."

"You're odd, too, you know, though not sullen."

Hermione laughed again. "I can't be sullen to a sweet old man like you, can I?"

"It would break my heart." Mr Waterbut faked wiping a tear in his cheek with the clean rag he was wiping glasses with.

"Don't worry, my dear Mr Waterbut, you're safe from that."

"As you are."

Hermione nodded into her glass. "Yes, well, my heart's quite safe now, because it was long broken."

She looked up and drew in her breath when she found Mr Waterbut sitting opposite her.

"Hermione, the truth is this: hearts don't break, they only bend. It's up to us to allow them to spring back to shape. Don't sit on your heart, colleen."

* * *

She walked back to MacElroy's, still dazed by Mr Waterbut's words, and found a gleaming van beside the battered car and her rental Volvo in one side of the pub's parking space. As she neared the door, she heard a high female voice.

"But where is she? You don't think she went to Faerie Hill by herself, Kathy? What did you do, Andrei?"

And to Hermione's confusion, they laughed at that last. She opened the door.

"Is that you, Hermione?"

Hermione nodded. That was all she could do because she was engulfed in thick soft arms, which smelled of lilacs and wine.

What was it with plump women and their expansive natures?

"Call me Aunt Patty, and this is my daughter, Kathy, and her husband, Jack Ryan. We're so sorry we didn't make it yesterday, but it was slushing so much my friend Deidre just wouldn't let us leave anymore because we also got delayed by Kathy's doctor." She said all this in one breath, and while still hugging Hermione. At last, she let go and looked Hermione up and down, thereby giving Hermione the chance to see Kathy—who had red hair and brown eyes like Ginny; and Jack, a Celtic rogue with his dark hair and blue eyes.

"Well, have you rested? Did Andrei take care of you? Where have you been?" Aunt Patty asked, squeezing Hermione's hand and leading her to a chair.

"You didn't go to the cliffs again, did you?"

They all looked at Andrei: the smiles of the MacElroys slid off when they saw he wasn't kidding. Hermione flushed. What was with this man?

"Of course I haven't been to the cliffs. I just went to the Green—I mean, I just looked around at the greenery," she finished rather lamely. She was too busy trying not to scowl at Andrei.

"That's good, then." Still not smiling, he turned to the direction of the kitchen, leaving Hermione under the bemused eyes of the MacElroys.

"What was that about? Did you two have a row about cliffs, Hermione?" Jack grinned.

"I—I don't know." Hermione forced herself to grin back.

* * *

"It's a shame you never came when your grandmother visited us, you know. She was a dear to all of us, Maude Alice was." Aunt Patty gave Hermione another helping of mashed potatoes and then heaped some more on her own plate.

It was lunch, and they dined in the private dining room of the pub, which was also sometimes rented out. It was only the three of them women, plus little Ron in his high chair. Andrei and Jack were manning the pub. They already had tourists even this early, and some local bachelors who couldn't cook their own lunch if a stove sat beside them.

"I was busy with school. I'm glad I'm here now." And Hermione was surprised to feel she meant it. "I like hearing her name. iMaude./i I wish my parents had given me that name, too."

"It seems to have magic in it, that name," Kathy said.

Before Hermione could wonder whether they knew her grandmother's abilities, Aunt Patty added, "Oh yes, Hermione, we have another Maude here. Your grandmother is always referred to as Maude Alice, to distinguish her from the other Maude, who is said to have been the maiden who first lived in the cottage in Faerie Hill, way back when the Irish and English were still at war. She's famous because it's said she wept so much until the day she died when she lost her betrothed in a battlefield that a stream was formed by her tears, a stream that still flows there in that hill to this day."

"It's a sad story. Even the other version I like better which is that Maude wept because she had spurned a faerie lover, and he had cursed her to never love or be loved again," Kathy made a face. "Maude Alice is different. Now that's a sunny gal, wasn't she, ma?"

"She had her own heartaches, too, Kathy. But she found Alphonse. It's a shame they went to England, but they returned now and then, and by Finn, I'm glad they did, I could never forget Maude Alice's smile. It was so sad when we learned she died, but we were all touched when we learned she had chosen to be buried here. Don't be surprised when you see fresh flowers on her grave, Hermione."

"And then Alphonse is also buried beside her. How sweet, those two," said Kathy, giving her Ron a slice of carrot. "Are iyou/i going to be buried beside me?" she asked Jack when he peeped into the room to wave at his son.

"Are you kidding, Katherine?" he growled in mock disgust. Before Kathy could scowl at that, he kissed her quick on the lips. Kathy blushed. Jack grinned. "I'll _always_ sleep beside you, you know that."

Aunt Patty rolled her eyes at Ron. Ron threw the carrot at his dad's hair.

* * *

"Oh, I forgot to ask Kathy the result of her sonogram!"

"It's a girl," Draco answered morosely, not taking his eyes off the front of the car.

He saw her wince and chastised himself for being too snappy. But Merlin, he just couldn't be all chatty with her. She didn't know who he really was, and that was worse, because, knowing her, he knew she'd befriend him. And add to that his midnight meeting with that old barrel-belly loon. He scowled more. He couldn't wait until he delivered Hermione to her cottage. He would then be free of her and her lost-puppy look.

It was raining again. He drove slowly up the hill in this ridiculous rental car Hermione had. He was just thankful he'd gotten used to driving by now, or he really would have been muttering imprecations aloud, instead of in his mind only. He chanced a side-glance at her. Big mistake.

"Have I done something, Andrei?"

"Er, no. Sorry." He'd been saying that a lot lately.

She didn't persist and he was grateful. For the next ten minutes of their drive, she remained silent. When he stopped the engine, she gave a little jump. He jumped, too. She'd been napping. Was he dreading looking at her that much that he hadn't even seen that?

"Oh, my, how lovely." She fished for her umbrella and got out before he could say 'snitch'. He sighed and followed her.

She stood smiling at him while he fumbled with the key on the door. '_It was charmingly arched. And how cute to have the knob in the center.'_ He just nodded.

Inside, she grew quiet, drinking in the cozy warmth of the place. He looked around, seeing it through her eyes.

The furniture was old, the chintz was faded, but it suited the cottage that way. The cat leaped from its basket and sniffed around at the rugs, and when he pawed a glass figurine of a snowdrop, Hermione grabbed him and the trinket. She smiled as she brought it to the light. It gleamed and sparkled like a diamond blossom, and it reflected in her eyes—

"Erm, I'll light a fire for you here and in your bedroom. So you can settle in."

"Oh, that's alright. I can manage—" But he was already at the grate.

"You know peat?" he asked, as he arranged bricks of it in the hearth.

"Yes, it's made from moss, right?"

He restrained himself from rolling his eyes. "Yes, yes, well, it's all you have here, because it's what Maude Alice preferred. If you want wood, Aunt Patty would surely send you some. Or I could cut for you. Meantime, you just pile these here, they light easily enough."

He turned to look at her and felt like she kicked him in the stomach, though all she did was sit there beside him. The glow from the fire made her eyes glint like it was gold. She looked so contented; for once she'd lost the lost-puppy look.

He thought now that it's worse when she didn't wear the lost-puppy look. She turned to smile at him. _Yes, it was worse_.

"Thanks, Andrei. Would you like some tea before you go?"

_Merlin.

* * *

_

**Author's Note**: Hmm, that "hearts don't bend" thing doesn't sound very original to me. I know I've read it somewhere. Here's the acknowledgment to that eloquent someone. Please review! Again, aside from the HP characters, I also borrowed the names of those from Nora Roberts's her Irish Trilogy. Apart from that, I'm an honest worker. :))


	3. Turning around

_**Turning around

* * *

**_

She fished for her tea canister in one of her bags and went back to the little kitchen. Andrei was seated hunched at the little table, seemingly too big for the little room. Hermione was amused at all the 'little's' in her mind. Well, it was a little house. A doll's house. Perfect for solitude. Already, she was regretting her hospitality. That deep armchair in front of the fire in the living room called her name and told her to hurry up and cuddle up with one of her books. But she smiled at Andrei, who was now her guest. He looked away.

This man piqued her curiosity. Morose persons had that effect on her. She wanted to know what they wouldn't say. She knew only one other person who acted like this, and that was… Malfoy. But he was so foul-mouthed she had cringed at the mere thought of meddling with him during that time they'd been around each other.

"It hasn't steeped yet," she heard herself say as Andrei made to pour the teapot.

"I know." He removed his hand from the pot and looked around the room again, everywhere except at her.

"Haven't you been here before?"

"I have. Jack had me help him hook up the electricity and the phone again when we heard you'd be coming over to stay."

"Thanks. Before that, the house was empty, then?"

He looked at her this time, and sneered. "I would have thought that was obvious."

Hermione's eyes grew wide. Andrei looked stricken. He stood up.

"Where are you going? You haven't had your tea yet."

The stern command in her voice made him look at her again. She dared him with her eyes. He sat back down.

"You just reminded me of someone I knew."

"Oh?" he asked.

"Yes, a _close_ friend."

He just looked at her. Hermione smiled. His eyes were glinting.

"From school."

"Really. Where did you go to school anyway?"

"I think you know."

"Why? Did you go to school hereabouts? I thought you grew up in England."

Hermione was beginning to feel ashamed again. But she carried on. "My school's name was Hogwarts."

Andrei laughed, but it was a nervous laugh. She used it so often herself. The laugh you used to cover up your humiliation or anger. Hermione glared at him, prepared for the confession. Oh, she got him—

"That was funny."

Hermione opened her mouth but no sound came out at first. He was wiping tears from his eyes. "What was funny?" she demanded, feeling her face growing warm.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry. You mean, that's indeed what your school is called? I thought you were joking."

Hermione groaned inwardly. She poured the tea and tried to smile and stop her blush at the same time. "No, I wasn't joking."

He turned his eyes back to the window. "Well, I haven't heard of that school ever. Exclusive, is it?"

"Oh, yes, very. A boarding school for…for arts."

"That's nice. I went in Wicklow."

"Oh," Hermione nodded dumbly, and then scalded her tongue on her tea. Her eyes stung, but she looked right back at him when he stood up to leave. He was now positively grinning.

* * *

Hermione licked a healing paste for burns from the palm of her hand, rinsed her mouth with water, and then scowled at her reflection in the carved mirror. Why was she being so insistent that Andrei MacElroy was Draco Malfoy? It was ridiculous, and just _what_ would she gain from it if she was right?

"What, indeed, huh, Crooks?" she said to Crookshanks, as she picked him up from the tile floor of the bathroom. They went to the bedroom, Hermione's feet denting the thick carpet. This bedroom was also in pink and white. No wonder Maude Alice and Kathy got along so well, Hermione thought amusingly.

She threw Crookshanks on the bed and looked out the window at the beauteous night. The moon was so big and so near it looked like she could reach out and scoop it into her hand. The stars were winking at her. The sky itself was perfect velvet, no clouds marring it. The rain had left diamonds of dewdrops to sparkle in the leaves of the trees. It was on a night like this when…

With a jolt, she realized what day it was.

February twenty-ninth.

She clutched the window sill as if she was drowning. Her knees have unlocked. She slid onto the floor.

Crookshanks leapt off the bed and came to her as she sobbed there by the window of Faerie Hill Cottage.

It was February twenty-ninth—the anniversary of the night Ron proposed to her.

And tomorrow, it was his birthday.

* * *

_"Dear Hermione,_

How are you settling in? I know it's too early to write, but Ginny pushed me into this. She'll write you herself later in the afternoon, because mornings are the worst for her. Nights aren't so much better either. Wait 'til you see my bruises. Don't tell Ginny I told you this: she tells Mum it's because I always bump my head in the bathroom door at night, but Ginny somehow likes thunking me in the forehead with her fist nowadays. It's so weird. When I refuse or dodge, she cries! Merlin.

Anyway, we're having a party today as usual. Are you coming? Of course, you can, and of course, we're expecting you, Ginny just says to tell you that we're sorry we're not there with you right now, but you need this time alone. And that place is perfect.

Hermione, we love you.

Harry."

Hermione smiled through her tears and continued stroking Hedwig, who seemed to understand her current state and tolerated the long petting. From where she was still huddled by the window (she had cried herself to sleep right there), Hermione summoned a quill, an ink bottle and a little square of parchment and wrote a short reply on her lap.

After Hedwig flew off, Hermione dragged herself to bed and burrowed deep under the covers. If she was lucky, she could pass off this day sleeping.

Knocks came from downstairs.

Well, why did she even think she'd be lucky, anyway?

With a groan, she threw off the blankets. She groped for her wand in her dressing table and groomed herself by magic. As she passed a mirror in the hall downstairs, she saw her eyes. She pointed her wand at them. She couldn't welcome visitors looking like an axe murderer. She pasted a smile on her face and opened the door.

Oh, how lovely to start a day with Andrei MacElroy falling on top of her.

* * *

He sprang back upright in an instant, muttered a curse, and then held out a hand to help her up. When she was steady on her feet again, he retreated back outside the door. They stood there facing each other, panting a little, blushing a lot. Mortification and surprise and annoyance, mutual.

"You opened the door just when I pushed it open myself, I'm sorry for squashing you."

"Apology accepted. Good morning, Andrei."

He looked at her for several moments, as though searching for something in her face. And then he shrugged. "Aunt Patty told me to get you. You'll breakfast with us—if you like."

"I like, but I'm sorry; can you tell Aunt Patty I'm not feeling alright this morning? Nothing to worry about, I always get these bilious attacks every now and then, but particularly when I travel."

"That's rather belated, isn't it?"

"Yes, quite." _And there's no need to look as if you're disappointed or worried._

He looked at her garden, at her, at her garden, and then back at her. "Should I stay with you?"

Hermione's hand flew to the jamb in amazement. Really, this man seemed to always jar her. She smiled and shook her head. "Thank you so much, but I'll be fine; in fact, I want to be alone for today."

He nodded at her stoop. "The telephone's right there. And our number beside it in the little book. If you need anything, just holler."

He went back down her front walk. Hermione closed the door with a sigh of relief. And then she bolted to the window and peered through the curtains. Yes, he _walked._ He had walked miles to her cottage and was now walking back to the village.

* * *

Since she was out of bed, she didn't go back. Instead, after annoying Crookshanks by moving from chair to chair in the living room _and_ the kitchen, she went out the cottage and drank in the morning.

Some very early flowers were already flaunting their beauty in the beds; Hermione wished she knew their names. She hadn't been that keen in gardening. As she walked to the little gate, she saw more green points sprouting out of the rich black soil, coaxed into coming out by the warmth of the bright sun. Hermione turned her face up to the sunshine and swung the gate open.

With pleasure, she realized this hill was all her own. The cottage was the only building on site, and around it was endless greenery, laced by the stream and dotted with tiny ponds and copses of trees.

A bird flew close overhead, twittering a song, and though the robin was a redbreast, she remembered another little bird, gray and noisier and naughtier.

An owl named Pigwidgeon. A bird that molted and never regrew its feathers. A bird now dead.

The landscape blurred. Tears came again and fell.

* * *

She never knew how far she wandered, but the next she knew, she was sitting in Mr Waterbut's bar, holding a new glass of sour buttercream again.

"Why do I have the feeling your pub is following me around. Mr Waterbut?"

"Perhaps it is." The old man grinned.

Hermione looked down at her glass and toyed with the orange umbrella Mr Waterbut had stuck there. Without warning, a lump rose in her throat. She hastily gulped down some of her drink, and surreptitiously dropped the umbrella to the floor, where she couldn't see it. "Aunt Patty invited me for breakfast, but I declined. I wanted to be alone today."

Mr Waterbut nodded and patted her hand. "Solitude never harms us most of the time. You can sit here all day. I shan't bother you, don't worry, mavourneen."

"Have you ever experienced grief before?"

Even Hermione was surprised when she heard herself ask that. Mr Waterbut looked up and his face softened even more.

"Ah, my dear, no race is spared from grief. It passes over us all, like time. And like time, it goes on. Sometimes, though, we clutch it to us."

"What do you mean? It's what clutches us, not the other way around."

Mr Waterbut smiled. He put down his rag and came around the bar, tugging off his apron as he went. He was wearing a maroon sweater. Hermione looked away and glared at the window. She shouldn't have come here.

She gave a little jump when she felt Mr Waterbut pulling her by the waist to her feet. Reluctantly, Hermione left her stool and allowed the old man to steer her to the back of the pub, where he opened a door.

They went out to an open meadow, with wild grass and honeysuckle. Directly in front of them was a pond, large and curiously shaped, tapering at one side and big at the other where a stream fed it. But Hermione had no interest in the landscape at the moment; she just gave her host a petulant look, reproaching him for not leaving her alone in her stool as he'd promised. He smiled again and led her to sit down on a rock by the pond.

"This is fed by the stream from Faerie Hill, the stream of Maude's tears." He put a hand to his collar and touched something there, but he didn't take it out. He just looked far off as if seeing something in the distant mountains.

"I did experience grief, Hermione. And it was so great that I walked on this earth for chiliads, but everything passed me by. I did my work, I did my share, but I wasn't really present. I chose to nurse my grief; I refused to let it go, so that even Lilias I nearly lost before I came to my senses.

"There is no grief greater than the grief brought by love lost or love unanswered. But the heart is not meant for grieving. It is meant for living. We can't do the two at the same time. You will have to let go of one or the other."

Hermione was crying freely now, though she never looked once at Mr Waterbut as he spoke, but at the pond, which reflected the sky and everything around it like a mirror, including herself, and she saw how forlorn and _dead_ she looked.

Mr Waterbut lowered himself on the grass beside her and placed an arm around her shoulders. "You don't like what you see, do you, Hermione? You want to live again, don't you?"

"It's so hard," Hermione choked. "H-he's been gone almost five years, but I loved him so much. It's not fair—"

"I know, colleen. But neither is it fair that you pine away like this for him forever, is it? Do you think he is happy seeing you like this from wherever he is?"

"I've had those same words from Harry and Ginny." She laughed shakily.

"It's about time you listen then."

Parchment, quill and inkbottle appeared in his hands. Hermione was too exhausted with crying to even be amazed at this wandless magic, however. She just accepted the things when Mr Waterbut handed them over.

"Write down everything. Talk to whomever you want, even Ron, if you like, but mostly you must talk to yourself, and tell it everything. Sometimes we don't even realize what we are bottling up." And he touched his collar again. There was a small bulge there, like an elongated locket of some kind. "And then, toss it into the stream. So that your grief, like Maude's, will flow away, go on to the sea and leave you free."

* * *

"Where have you been? Darcy's away, isn't she?"

Draco rolled his eyes at Aunt Patty's matchmaking. Darcy was a neighbor, a beautiful neighbor he sometimes flirted with, but he'd never gone near her door. He had no interests in such things. But when he went on his ramblings, he let Aunt Patty and Kathy think what they liked.

"I don't even know Darcy's away, Aunt Patty. I've been to Faerie Hill—"

"Aha, I thought so," Kathy grinned, wiping her mouth and surfacing from the sink, where she had been venting her morning sickness. "I like Hermione for you. Darcy's sweet, but she has nothing but air in her beautiful head compared to a Fitzgerald."

Draco sputtered in his black coffee. Jack thumped him in the back. "Katherine, the girl hasn't been here a week and you're already launched on your naughty thoughts. Give Draco two weeks at least. He's that slow."

Indignantly, Draco pushed Jack off him while Kathy and Aunt Patty laughed. When will they ever get tired of setting him up with every girl that lived and breathed in, or walked into, Ardmore?

At least, they paired him with a witch this time. But still, she'd be the last witch who'd ever consider him, if at all, he laughed inwardly. And he only went up there because of Harry's letter. Scarhead's bloody crotchety white owl had woken him up at _three in the morning_ with a note.

_Draco,_

How are you? It's been a long time.

Well, I'll go straight to the point. Sorry for waking you up at this hour, it's urgent; I clean forgot what date it was. Ginny remembered just now, too, and nearly wet the bed in anxiety. It's February twenty-ninth, Draco, the anniversary of Ron and Hermione's engagement.

I don't know if she forgot, too. We place hope in her preoccupation about settling in at the cottage, but could you look in on her later this morning? She may forget about February twenty-ninth, the date hasn't befallen us before anyway; but she won't forget March first. It's Ron's birthday and this is the first time we won't be with her since what happened.

Just be with her for a bit if that's what she needs, but don't push yourself on her either, Ginny says. Anyway, there you go. Just do what you can, this is a big favor.

Thank you so much. I owe you. I'll give you a whole cake when my child is born. We're expecting in July. Hope to see you some time then.

Harry"

Of course, Draco hadn't gotten back to sleep. Instead, he'd rambled around again. He was also looking forward to seeing Harry, so Draco could give him a punch in the nose for disturbing his peace a lot lately. He'd made it to the foot of Faerie Hill and saw everything calm and silent in the little house.

He'd been walking back to MacElroy's, thinking longingly of his bed, when he met the old man again, who'd ranted about fate again and Draco's place in it and how everyone had a part, whether good or ugly. We just had to accept that and get on with life.

Draco scowled at his coffee now and growled mockingly at little Ron when the toddler greeted him good morning by throwing his favorite, drool-covered rubber banana at his favorite uncle.

_I **am** getting on with life. Everyone just seems to be poking their heads into it lately._

He remembered how Hermione nearly had him yesterday. Nearly. As always, he'd been perfect with evasion. He grinned.

But then he remembered her face when she opened the door to him this morning. She hadn't even changed her clothes. And her eyes had that stretched look of having been magically refreshed, which he knew too well, having done it countless times.

His grin was replaced by a grimace. And he rolled his eyes at the ceiling in frustration.

"You're making a lot of faces today, Andrei. You _have_ been meeting up with some lass."

"Yeah. Yeah, Aunt Patty. Some lass."

* * *

Hermione watched the thick roll of parchment darken as it absorbed the water from the stream, and then it began to sink, until it floated away with nothing but a shadow in the surface denoting its journey.

The sun was about to sink, and the sky was tinted gold and mauve. Hermione retraced her steps backwards to the rock she had sat on, not taking her eyes away from the sky. She lowered herself slowly, thinking that if she made any sudden moves or sounds, she might dislodge this peace she had suddenly found within herself.

Yes, at last, she felt _peaceful._

Beside her on a little cloth in the grass, the food Mr Waterbut brought her lay untouched. She had never once paused in her writing. She looked at the stream, but the parchment bearing her last five years and the years before that was long gone. Curiously, her heart felt even lighter because of that.

Robins twittered at her from a nearby tree, and Hermione smiled. She held on to her hair as a breeze teased it out of its band. She didn't bring her eyes away from the sky, which was now red. Bright soft red like Ron's hair.

_"I'm turning around now. I'll always look back to you and smile and cry, but I'm turning around now, Ron."_

She said that aloud. And though her voice shook, she made it to the end without breaking down. She nodded to herself, convincing herself that she could do it and that she meant it.

One of the robins shrieked very much like Pigwidgeon and flew off merrily.

_Oh, Ron._ With another smile—this one the brightest she had ever had in years—she picked up her food and went back inside the Green Dragon.

* * *

With quick long strides, Draco made his way through the darkening sunset, and if the cursed old man chanced to accost him now, he will have to bear being brushed off like a fly whether he liked it or not, but Draco would ask to use his fire. He had to Floo Harry. Their precious Hermione was missing.

He had gone back to the cottage after lunch, even bringing a hamper of sandwiches as an excuse for being there. After knocking for half an hour and still not receiving an answer, he had entered the house, to find all the rooms empty.

He had fought down panic and the urge to bolt and examine the cliffs. He had sat by her stoop and waited for her to return. If she was only rambling around, she would go back to eat soon enough. But now, dinnertime would soon be past, and he had seen neither hair nor hide of her.

Draco stopped in the middle of the road, gritting his teeth. Just when you were looking for him, he wouldn't appear, the old bastard. He waited some more, chanting the old man's name in his mind, but nothing appeared, not even a twig.

He looked around. He would have to use an owl.

But there was no owl in sight.

Resignedly and cursing a certain old man in his mind for not being there when he was needed, Draco turned to go home. His stomach growled and he scowled more darkly as he remembered the sandwiches he'd made; now hardening in Hermione's stoop.

He opened the door.

_"Where have you been?"_

At his bellow, Aunt Patty dropped her knife, Kathy jumped, and then giggled to Jack, and Hermione only stared up at Draco. He froze there by the door of the dining room, stunned by the look on her face. She wasn't wearing the lost-puppy look.

"Where have _you_ been, Andrei?" Aunt Patty asked, barely stifling her wide, mischievous smile.

"I've been to Faerie Hill. _You_ weren't there. Where were you?" he asked Hermione.

She looked bewildered. "I'm not there because I'm here."

"She'd come this evening to dine with us. You must have missed her. So stop looking like you're about to kick and scream worse than Ron, Andrei."

He scowled at Kathy, who was still giggling. Before he could escape to sulk in his room, Aunt Patty pulled him down on the chair beside her, which was beside Hermione. She shifted to give him more room and smiled timidly.

He looked away, seething that he'd allowed her to worry him. What did he care about her whereabouts? She had only come this evening, which meant she was Merlin-knows-where in the afternoon. She could have been with some Irishman, for all he knew.

_"Andrei!"_

_"What?_ Oh, sorry, sorry."

He hadn't realized he had been ladling the stew so violently that dollops had flown to Aunt Patty's hand.

* * *

_**Author's Note:** Though I made my own twist for it, the 'throw it into the stream' scene is adapted from Paulo Coelho's "By the River Piedra, I Sat Down and Wept", a gut-wrenching, love story. Please review! Thank you! And it would be wonderful if you would tell your friends about stories you like. *hint hint :)) _


	4. Pumpyumpyumpkin!

**_Pumpy-umpy-umpkin

* * *

_**

_"Dear Hermione,_

How are you? You really must be enjoying yourself. We were ever so surprised when we received your letter saying you wouldn't come, but we weren't worried. We know you. We trust you. We're so glad we sent you there.

Take care of yourself. We miss you, but don't hurry back. You need this holiday. Don't ask me about work, I won't answer you.

P.S: I'm having trouble sleeping and waking, but Mum says it's just part of the joys of motherhood. I'm really big already. Fred and George are betting I'm carrying twins! I don't have a problem with that, but I hope to Merlin they won't take after their twin uncles.

We have the names ready. I won't tell you as of now. Yes, I'm wearing my wicked grin.

Though I also have to pee every five minutes, I love every minute of this, Hermione. And I can't wait!

Love, Ginny.

Hermione placed Ginny's letter on her table and began to write a reply, nibbling on muffins, which had come from Aunt Patty that morning. On the window ledge, Hedwig sat waiting, pecking every now and then on the muffin beside her. Crookshanks snoozed by Hermione's feet. It was four in the afternoon, and a sultry breeze was playing around Ardmore. Hermione leaned back, breathed in, stretched, and then faced her parchment.

_"Dear Ginny,_

I miss you, too. And I'm not quite happy not seeing you with your belly all big with the next Potter! Since you won't allow me to break my hiatus, can you visit me one afternoon when you're feeling good?

You and Harry weren't exaggerating when you told me how beautiful this place was. Spring has come and I have loads of flowers in my yard! I don't know their names and I'm thinking of getting a book on gardening when I go downtown.

Oh, and I'm so sorry I took this long to reply. I've been occupied with rambling this hill and dining with the MacElroys—really lovely people. When I came in the day you sent your letter, it was already late and Hedwig was gone. I had to wait until you made her return for my letter. Yes, I'm wearing my wicked grin here, too.

And one more thing—do you know Blenkinsop Waterbut? He owns the Green Dragon. How come you didn't tell me about him and his pub? He said he'd been here for ages, so it was impossible you didn't meet him. It's been so nice talking to him; he has helped me a lot. I'm asking you about him now because I've been looking for his pub for a week, but I can't find it! Of course I couldn't ask the Muggles, since they're not even aware of its being there.

Kiss Harry and all the Weasleys for me. I'll say goodbye for now because I also owe Mum a letter. Take care, Gin, you and my godchild/godchildren. I'm excited, too! And yes, thank you for sending me here. I'm glad I came. I just hope I'll find Mr Waterbut again or else I will have to look for a remedy for my craving for sour buttercream.

Love, Hermione. 

* * *

"There's no need to go all the way to Waterford for a book on gardening, my dear. Kathy and I know the critters that bloom here, we'll be happy to introduce them to you."

"I'll be happier introducing her to a man, though. Have you a sweetheart back in England, then, Hermione?" Kathy asked, ducking when Aunt Patty aimed a potato at her. "What, ma? There's nothing wrong with that. We're cousins after all."

Hermione gave a small laugh, that laugh she used when not feeling inclined to laugh at all. "Oh, erm, no, I don't have a sweetheart back in England."

Kathy's eyes gleamed with interest. "Never had one either?"

"Kathy, you prying wench—"

"Don't pretend like you're not interested, Ma." And Kathy ducked again. The potato did sail this time and landed by the kitchen door. Hermione was glad to leave the table to pick it up, thereby having the chance to blink her eyes and take a deep breath.

"It's alright, Aunt Patty," she said to the woman as she handed back the potato. "Yes, I did have a sweetheart. He died, though."

Both women gasped and crossed themselves. Kathy looked stricken. "Oh, Ma, throw that potato at me again, I won't duck this time. I'm so sorry, Hermione, I had no idea."

"I understand. He's not supposed to be dead, is he? Perhaps he could have left me for another, or gone someplace, but not dead. He was too young to die."

They looked at her uncertainly. And then Aunt Patty scooted her chair nearer Hermione and patted her shoulder. "You are too young to be left like that, too, poor lass."

Hermione shrugged off the comforting arm and drank the rest of the cold coffee left in Aunt Patty's mug. "Please don't, you two. When you get me started, I won't stop. He'll be gone five years this June."

"Five years. Aww, you loved young. That's the sweetest love of all."

Hermione smiled at Kathy. "Yes. But the funny thing was we spent most of those years we were together bickering. Sometimes I wish I could go back in time and—"

"Oh, my dear, I could only imagine. But don't think like that. I'm sure he wouldn't have had it any other way either. And I should have known. An intelligent girl like you will never like a passive boy. You'd want someone who challenges you and annoys you, because it tickles your brains to challenge and annoy him back."

"I'll keep that in mind, thanks, ma," Kathy said, writing on an invisible notepad and winking at Hermione.

Aunt Patty rolled her eyes at her daughter. "Hermione, why don't you stay with us instead? It's too lonesome for you to be alone in Faerie Hill. You need company, I think."

_"Don't."_

They all turned their heads sharply to the door. Andrei had poked his head in and had thrown a piece of large fish in the sink.

"Don't take her up in her offer," he told Hermione without looking at her. "She'll only have you working like a horse in the pub." He turned away.

"You're not working like a horse at all, Andrei. And I'll take some off your wage this week for complaining."

Kathy and Aunt Patty laughed as Andrei's head thunked resonantly on the door jamb. Hermione joined in, and she _might_ just take up Aunt Patty in her offer. Why not? They radiated sympathy and warmth, and she loved the way they reassured her about Ron. She never liked solitude when she wasn't studying or working. And here she would be closer to the Green Dragon, though it still hadn't reappeared to her.

* * *

Draco couldn't wait until lunch was through and Hermione would go back to her cottage. But just his luck, it rained. Business in the pub slackened, and so Kathy and Aunt Patty sat Hermione down in one of the tables and they put their heads together about some thing or other leaving him and Jack to do the mopping and wiping.

"She's got a thing with her, that lass," Jack mumbled, while gathering empties.

"What thing?" Draco grunted, pushing the mop savagely across the floor. He didn't look up to look at Hermione as Jack was doing.

"I've never seen you this grumpy about a girl, ol' boy," Jack mused, grinning now.

"Kathy and Aunt Patty are rubbing off on you."

"I'm just saying, Hermione looks like she could do with some cheering up. She looks like she's been scolded and whipped, you know? Very melancholy and scared."

"Scared?" Now he did look at Hermione. And at that precise moment she caught his eyes, her laughter turned into sobs.

* * *

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry—I just—"

"What have I said, Hermione?"

"Nothing really, Kathy, it was just—" Hermione swallowed. "His name was Ron."

The two women's faces crumpled with shocked dismay, and she felt all the more ashamed when Jack and Andrei hurried over.

"What happened? Why are you crying, Hermione?" Jack asked kindly.

"We were talking about—your son—dirtying his nappies," Kathy answered wryly, putting an arm around Hermione. "It's okay, Hermione."

"Oh, well, that's pretty upsetting." Jack nodded emphatically. Aunt Patty glared at him though the corners of her lips twitched.

"I'm sorry," Hermione said again. Oh, Merlin, how embarrassing to break down like that, and in the middle of conversation! She'd never done that before, and she'd never thought it possible, not after the peace and lightheartedness she had newly acquired. She had been laughing, and then—it just broke out of her. "I shouldn't have—"

"That's ridiculous. You can cry all you want, dear, and you should! It's better that way," Aunt Patty intoned.

Hermione shook her head, willing her face to go back to normal color. She felt as if all her blood was pumping there. "Thank you for having me here. I guess I should go back now."

"No!" Kathy almost cried. "I'm not letting you go back there and be alone tonight after I made you cry. This is all my doing, prying you awhile ago. You'll stay here with us for tonight. Jack, I'm staying here too, okay?"

"Absolutely, Katherine." Before he returned to the bar, Jack gave Hermione a light squeeze in the shoulder for comfort.

Andrei turned to make his way back to the spot he was mopping, too. He had never once met her eyes during the commotion, so it was understandable that she jumped a little when she felt his hand on her shoulder. Just a second's touch, but also offering comfort.

* * *

Hermione had always loved the hour just after the sun rose.

She remembered how when she was at the Burrow, she would get up immediately and watch Ginny sleeping, and then tiptoe to the attic and see Harry and Ron snoring. She liked looking at people while they slept. They looked so peaceful that way, and adorable. Especially Ron. She smiled.

She didn't know if it was just her, or spring, or an effect of the wine she and Kathy had downed last night, but this morning looked brighter than any other. And she could hear the birds making quite a racket outside her windows. She could feel a combined lightness and heaviness in her head, but she smiled and threw off the covers so that the sunlight bathing her bed would bath her skin, too. She soaked up the warmth.

It was spring. Spring! She'd had other springs before, but right now, she felt as if she was also leaving hibernation. Like a squirrel. She laughed a little at that. _"You little brown chipmunk,"_ Ron had said once.

"I'm definitely hung over, I guess."

She tidied her face and hair and went out of her room. The hall was silent. Well, not exactly silent. She could hear little Ron crying. To her surprise, the sound came from the door just down the hall.

She went to it, and hurried inside.

But Ron was already being taken care of. Andrei had the baby in his arms, dancing in big bouncy steps. He froze though when he saw her.

"Good morning. What's upset the little fellow?" Hermione smiled.

Andrei looked away, placed Ron in his crib, and went to a little counter in the room where bottles and a can of infant formula stood. "Kathy went home for a bit and Jack's helping Aunt Patty with the day's deliveries so I got stuck with this little guy, who's just in the mood to give me trouble."

"Oh, I bet not. Maybe he's just hungry. Aren't you, sweetie?" she crooned at the crib. But Ron still cried. Hermione patted his tummy, and he calmed a little.

"Why don't you go downstairs and have your breakfast while I take care of Ron?"

"Oh, okay." Hermione kissed the baby and went out, not without smiling at Andrei. She didn't forget kindnesses. And Andrei had been kind yesterday. She only grinned when, as usual, he turned away.

She didn't go downstairs, though. Instead she stood by the hall's window. It looked out on the parking lot, but beyond the parking lot was the little road, lined with hedges, and beyond the road was the sea, an expanse of blue intermingling with green, with gulls streaking over it, like little moving clouds. From the room to her right, she heard Ron start again.

"Hey, you're being tiresome, you little chipmunk. I'm onto you. And I'm not doing it! I'm not!" She heard Andrei say.

Ron howled.

"Merlin! I could kill your father for accustoming you to that, you spoiled monkey! You want me to sing the stupid song, don't you?"

Ron was quiet now. And so was Hermione. She could see her reflection in the window, and she wore an expression of dread and surprise.

"No, I won't. I'm not falling for your tricks."

Ron howled again.

"Oh, al_right!_ Merlin! I'll ask payment from Jack for this."

And then Andrei began to sing. He had lowered his voice though, so Hermione unconsciously went back to the door, opened it a crack and peered in.

_"…honeybunch, sugarplum, pumpy-umpy-umpkin.  
You're my sweetie pie.  
You're my cuppycake, gumdrop, snoogums-boogums,  
You're the apple of my eye.  
And I love you so and I want you to know  
That I'll always be right here.  
And I love to sing sweet songs to you  
Because you are so dear."_

Andrei had Ron in his arm and as he sang those silly sweet words, he swung around. The room rang with the child's giggles. Hermione was still dazed by what she heard awhile ago, but she couldn't help it, she giggled herself.

* * *

Draco froze for the second time in less than a half-hour. And for the second time in less than a half-hour, too, his heart made that weird jump, his stomach made that weird twitch and his breath forgot to flow smoothly.

_What was the matter with him?_

And what was the matter with _her?_ Why can't she leave him alone? There she was with her bright eyes and wild hair, leaning on the door jamb, laughing. His head filled with the sound like it was water and he was drowning. He scowled. She stopped giggling at Ron and straightened up.

"Sorry for spying. I was in the window in the hall, couldn't help but look when this imp started giggling."

"I told you to go downstairs and get your breakfast."

She blinked. And then her expression hardened. He was reminded of that time in her kitchen at the cottage when he had let slip. He had let slip again now.

"I'm sorry for disobeying your orders."

"It wasn't an order, alright?"

"Then why so upset that I'm still here? If it bothers you when I talk to you, just say so."

She waited. He didn't speak.

"Where did you learn the expression _'Merlin'_?"

His head snapped up. Ron looked from him to Hermione. And her face as she stood there undid him. What right had she to question him when she was the one intruding into his already quiet life?

"It does bother me when you talk. Are you satisfied?"

He would have liked it if she shouted at him or returned a retort or even just glared at him before turning to leave. But instead, the look on her face made him grimace and then snort at himself in disgust. She wasn't angry. She was hurt.

* * *

If he _was_ Draco Malfoy, why did he seem to hate her? They hadn't been exactly bosom friends, but she hadn't been outright hostile to him either, and even if she was, it was almost always his own fault, the foul-mouthed ferret.

She clapped a hand to her mouth almost as if she had spoken that thought. She sighed and dropped down on her heels in front of one of her flowerbeds. By her feet were daffodils and snowdrops uncurling in the dusk. They looked so strong and delicate at the same time, young blossoms. They had pushed out of the earth and were fighting to grow and bloom, but one step or one night of frost could crush and kill them. Perhaps that was why nature gave flowers. As symbols of strength and vulnerability. She had thought herself strong and brave once. Now she knew better. She had been weak and a coward. Perhaps she was _still_ weak and a coward as well. She had no way of knowing.

With a low hoot, Hedwig greeted her and alighted on her shoulder. Hermione stroked her and then took Ginny's letter from the owl's foot. It was short.

_"Who is Blenkinsop Waterbut?_

Is he some handsome Irishman I wasn't fortunate enough to meet? No, Hermione, we haven't met him, and nor have we seen The Green Dragon. That's strange, isn't it? I'm sure you will find him again and then you can satisfy curiosity, yours and mine.

I'm sorry I took this long to reply, I was in a particularly terrible mood swing yesterday and Harry is still suffering.

Tell me more about the MacElroys, how are they? And forgive us for not telling you about their baby's name. But now it seems we needn't have worried.

I might visit you, yes. I'm not telling you when. I'll just wait until I'm in a wicked enough mood to just barge in on you and your lover.

Mum and Dad and everyone are missing you and send you their love.

Love, Ginny.

Hermione laughed at the last part of Ginny's letter and tenderly pocketed the note. When Hedwig saw this, she nipped Hermione gently in the ear and then flew off into the golden sky. It was a glorious sunset again and Hermione stayed where she was, beside her flowers.

She didn't know when she started, but she suddenly heard herself singing, the words of that song she heard that morning coming out of her lips seemingly of their own accord. A soft breeze flew in from the sea, so that her flowers seemed to dance to the tune. She smiled and, though she felt a little silly, didn't stop singing.

* * *

He felt as if Kathy had walloped him with her maternity bag like she did seven months ago (He had just stood there in the room stunned while she shrieked for him to get Jack) when he made it to the crest of Faerie Hill and saw Hermione.

She was sitting beside her flowers, and singing. It was the same silly song Jack and Kathy had taught their son, but the words sounded like a…well, they sounded beautiful and heart-breaking at the same time.

_Heart-breaking?_ He had just thought such a word? He shook his head, took a deep breath, and proceeded to her low garden fence.

She saw him before he even reached the little gate. She stopped singing and stood up, waiting for him. He was unnerved though that she didn't look furious, which he thought she should be, which he felt he preferred, and which he definitely would have preferred, really. Why couldn't she hold grudges for once?

"Aunt Patty wants you for dinner," he said without preamble, looking at the thatched roof of the cottage.

She didn't answer and he looked at her. That was what she'd been waiting for, it seemed. She locked her eyes with his, smiled and said thanks.

He nodded dumbly. He felt dumb. He started to turn away and then turned back.

"I'm sorry for this morning—" they said in unison.

Draco was so startled at the sound of their voices mingling that he felt his face grow warm. Hermione laughed a little.

"Look, I'm really sorry, _Andrei._" And again, he was startled into looking at her. Her eyes were glowing, reflecting the gold in the sky. "I realize I was being impolite. And even if you _are_ hiding something from me, which I acknowledge is very rude of me to think—well, perhaps you have a reason to and you have every right to."

He just stared at her, at those eyes. She began to be uncomfortable now and looked back down at her flowers.

"Thanks," he heard himself whisper. She heard him though and smiled and shrugged.

"That's for taking care of Crookshanks when I was too upset and drunk last night to remember he's left alone here."

At first he had no idea what she was talking about. His mind seemed to be frozen. And then he felt himself smiling and shrugging back.

"Friends?" She held out her hand.

It was then that he panicked. He looked at her face, at her hand, and—

He took it in his, and shook it gently. She nodded. He noticed that her hand was a little clammy but perhaps she was only as nervous as he was.

_Cut it out. It's dusk and it's early spring, idiot. Not exactly warm yet. Why on earth would she be nervous with you?_

* * *

"I thought we'd have one last frost tonight, but again, weather is not a thing to be predicted, however long you have known it, just like our very own selves, eh?"

Draco rolled his eyes and stopped walking. So the man had thought to show himself at last. Without a word, he followed the shaft of light spilling out from the open door and went in the little pub. He also ignored the hearty pat he received on the shoulder.

"Well, it's been a long time. How have you been faring?" A tall tankard of creamy yellow drink was placed in front of Draco in the bar.

"Don't you serve any other drink in this place?" Draco asked.

Waterbut laughed. "There's no use pretending you don't like it. I think sour buttercream is like life. It's sharp, but it's sweet as well, and creamy so that you can't help but drink more."

Draco nodded impatiently and drank.

"How's Hermione?"

"Why? Haven't you been seeing her?"

Waterbut just gave that evasive shrug.

"She's great. My aunt and cousin are doting on her as if she's a little puppy."

"Is it my imagination, or do I sense jealousy?"

"It's your pesky imagination."

Waterbut laughed again.

"In any case, though you are grumpy as ever, I'm glad you have honored me with your presence in my humble pub."

"There's no use pretending this is my choice, alright. I just want to know why we're seeing each other again."

"Oh, I can't answer that. Everything would have been pointless if I do."

Draco glared at him and then vented his vexation on his tankard. But he had hardly drained it when it refilled itself as its bottom touched the bar.

"Please to drink your sour buttercream. It'll do you good."

Draco sighed and sipped. Before he lost his resolve, he blurted, "Remember when you told me that we all just had roles, whether good or bad? Those people who played bad roles—shouldn't they be punished, and if they're not, shouldn't they punish themselves to atone?"

"Atone? How? Isn't turning a new leaf atonement enough?"

Draco shook his head in frustration and expelled his breath in a rush. "It's not exactly atonement, is it; it's just what's right."

"Well, being happy is right, too, is it not?"

Draco stared at him, and then he lowered his eyes in confusion and disbelief. Merlin knew he wanted to believe though.

"You know, my boy, though you have shed your name, you are still letting your past grip you in a vise. Let yourself go. Why are you troubled of the 'threat' of becoming happy?"

"I don't deserve it."

"Years ago, we have covered this same subject, it's only different now in some respect."

"Yes!" Draco snarled. "I hurt people. I don't want the danger of doing that again."

"There is _always_ danger. There is not a safe moment in this world. That's why it's brave to live and to love."

Draco felt his face go warm. "Thanks for the drink. Good night." And with that, he hastily left the Green Dragon.

* * *

_**Author's Note:** 'The Cuppycake Song' was written by Judianna Castle and sung by Amy Castle._

Thank you for reading. Tell me what you think, please. ^_^ 


	5. Pins and needles

**_Pins and Needles_**

**_

* * *

_**

Every night, Hermione nodded off to sleep either after talking the night away with Kathy, or after reading in her chair in front of the fire in Faerie Hill Cottage. And then every morning, she would be roused by birds. Just like at Hogwarts. But here they sounded a legion, twittering and singing and fussing over the dawn of the new day, hopping around in some of Hermione's as-yet empty flowerbeds, where she had taken to throw bread crumbs, as advised by Aunt Patty. The birds ate them and their droppings made the soil richer for the flowers. Hermione would throw open her window and she was always amused when they all took flight, only to dive back down (to Crookshanks's indignation).

On those mornings, Hermione could sit for hours by her window, just drinking in the sights, smelling the air, and then when she couldn't bear it anymore, she would rush to her door, sometimes still in her pajamas, and plant herself in the midst of the wonder of it all. It was the simplest and greatest magic, spring.

Things asleep awakening again.

Like her.

* * *

With mortification, she realized she still had not gone to visit her grandparents' graves. She dressed and put on the lovely little bonnet Ginny had given her before she left. She tamed her hair under it, shooting it with spells, and then she grabbed Crookshanks before he could elude her. He _mrowled_ in disgust as she put on his booties. "You don't want mud on your feet, do you, Mr Priss?" she teased him. But really, his booties were for his joints. He was too old to prowl and prance around now.

The sun was deliciously warm; she took off her bonnet and cardigan before her cottage was even out of sight behind her. She had picked some of her early blooms. She tucked them into her bonnet and they made splashes of blue and purple and pink on her white sundress—the dress she reserved for visits to Ron. Her grandparents were just as special, if not more; perhaps it was partly guilt—this would be the first time she would see them since she went to Hogwarts.

The cemetery was only a little way down the hill, between her cottage and the village. The steeple of the quaint church stood like a sentinel and guardian beside it. It was a happy cemetery, all the graves well-kept and some with lightning rods on them, for those who would not lie peacefully. She looked for the adjacent round tombstones that she was familiar with from photographs her mother had shown her. Without difficulty, she discerned them against the honeysuckle-festooned trunk of a dead tree—like two lovers sitting, talking of nothing, lost in each other and the quiet beauty of the surroundings.

She shook her head at her nonsense. Her brain was stagnating, perhaps, giving way to this sentimentality. She heard chimes; the breeze picked up. Hermione shook her head again. But no, the chimes still rang from somewhere and the inscriptions were still engraved deep onto the marble of her grandparents' graves. They were not from her stagnating sensibilities at all.

The first and third lines were on her grandmother's headstone, the second and fourth were on her grandfather's, so that it looked like they were reading the verse to each other.

_"The rose is fairest when 't is budding new,  
And hope is brightest when it dawns from fears.  
The rose is sweetest wash'd with morning dew,  
And love is loveliest when embalm'd in tears."_

Only the young and only the old would say and think and believe such things. But she smiled at the prettiness and…magic of the words and sat down onto the grass, breathing deeply and still hearing the chimes. Perhaps they came from the church? The same church founded by Saint Declan? And what about the Tower, where, legend has it, the stones still sang of battle and glory?

It was all so enchanting, being in this quiet land vibrating with myth and history combined. Right then she was certain her loneliness and fears had evaporated, chased away by the…how could she put it—the humble majesty of nature's tranquility.

Crookshanks finally decided the various things buzzing around were unworthy of him and trotted over to Hermione. He sniffed around a little and then flopped down in the small space between the two graves.

* * *

"I am quite curious about it, too, my lass. You're such a beauty. Well—you may not be drop-dead gorgeous, but you do have this air…" Aunt Patty smiled indulgently as she wiped the bar. She and Kathy were at it again, matchmaking. Hermione just shook her head in bemusement. "And without turning around, I can assure you that every male eye in the pub is on you."

"Ma, she's still in mourning," Kathy hissed. She and her mother had somehow switched tunes. "And you know full well that they're only afraid of Jack, that's why none of them looks at me anymore."

Hermione laughed outright. Kathy wiped her spill. They were on the bar. It was after lunchtime, and they had just finished eating. Hermione had spent quite a number of _hours_ in that park of graves and was only reminded of the time when her stomach voiced its opinion. She went straight to MacElroy's (because she still can't find The Green Dragon). Crookshanks was curled up on one of the stools. "You can't be jealous, Kathy!"

"Oh, yes I am! Of that dress!"

Hermione plucked at the white cotton and mocked incredulity. Aunt Patty was unwilling to be shaken off like this and refilled Hermione's glass with, "Only saints and devils could live alone, an old proverb but a true one."

Hermione jumped when Andrei snorted beside her. He had joined them to place an order and deposit empties. He grimaced at his aunt. "You're quite maudlin, Patricia. You must learn to control such gush. They are not becoming and reveal your dotage," he said in mock high-handed tones. Hermione stared at him even as Aunt Patty shrieked and laughed and hit him with her rag.

He raised an eyebrow at her. She stopped staring and smiled, remembering her resolve not to pry. He fumbled with the tray and went off without another word.

"Look at him, he couldn't say more than a grunt when you're looking, Hermione."

Hermione jumped again. "Who?"

"Andrei! Where have you been, girl?"

"Oh, no, I don't think— He can't possibly—"

Aunt Patty and Kathy laughed. "Attraction between a man and a woman is rarely impossible. Why then do you sputter like that as if Andrei hasn't got eyes or blood in his veins?" the older woman said.

Hermione just shook her head and drank her mango nectar, laughing a little. To think that the man they were saying was attracted to her was someone she suspected of being Malfoy! Luckily, a whole family entered at that moment, and a troop of men early from work. Aunt Patty zoomed to the other end of the bar. Jack arrived from upstairs and deposited little Ron in Kathy's arms. The baby instantly lifted his arms toward Hermione, who took him happily.

"He's really taken with you, isn't he?"

"You're lucky to have such a sweet child."

"Not Ron, Andrei!"

"What? No, really—"

"I've never seen him act like this to a girl before. He's grumpy with you and hardly says a word. Could be you're scaring him. He always said he won't marry. And that drives every girl mad whenever he says that and then flirts around."

"Well, I guess I'm better off. I prefer surliness to flirting."

"Oh, because you'll be hooked if he flirts with you?"

"_Honestly_, Kathy! I think men who flirt are low. Ron didn't do it with me. No one else dared either." There was MacLaggen on her sixth year, the oaf. And Krum—but no, he was a little too reserved for that. After that, there was only Ron. And after that…there was no one else.

* * *

Jack winked at him from the small platform in the pub, and Draco could have thrown a mug at him. There he was, strumming and plucking at that guitar, while Draco was left at the bar, up to his arse in beer. Kathy and Aunt Patty were waitressing. There'd been a program at the school, and every family decided afterward to cap the day with Aunt Patty's beans and a pint. Jack was called to sing and play as usual. And while Draco didn't dislike the music and the liveliness of the pub, he was aggravated by some girl who wouldn't leave him in peace even she wasn't even there—

_"You're wasting good beer!"_

"Hey, Darcy, I didn't see you. Thank goodness."

Darcy lifted the flap, hurried over and turned the tap off. Draco blinked. He had nearly made being up to his ass in beer a reality. He set down the mug and hurried to get the mop.

"Don't tell Aunt Patty, she'll kill me," he muttered to the girl beside him. She had black hair like Jack, but hers was so dark it was almost blue. She was gazing at Draco with disbelief and amusement out of her long-lashed gray eyes.

"I suppose it's true what Kathy's saying then, that someone has caught Andrei's eyes at last."

He snorted. "The only things catching my eye right now are your lovely suede boots. And if you'll move, I won't ruin them." He threatened bringing down the beer-soggy mop on her feet. She jumped back and smacked him on the arm. She winked at him as she tied on an apron. She was always willing to help them out at the bar. She enjoyed the free drinks, and more people came over just to flirt with her as well. It was equal trade. "I only went to Dublin for a week and I already have competition."

"Shut up, Darcy, or they'll get wind of us. You don't want anyone beating me up. The transplant stealing the village's rose from right under everyone's noses."

She laughed. Draco gazed at her; she was beautiful. But he was seeing another person entirely in his mind's eye, whose laughter was…richer and warmer to his ears somehow.

"My God, Andrei, you're going to push Patty into bankruptcy if you keep pouring her beer on the floor! You _are_lovestruck!"

Andrei jumped and threw a rag on the spot where he'd spilled again, muttering a curse. Darcy looked startled. He grinned. "Sorry. I'm just nervous. Not so loud, though, my darling, or I would be ambushed on my way to snatching you away tomorrow."

Darcy rolled her eyes.

The phone hanging on the wall behind them rang. Normally, Draco never answered the phone; he was still wary of that Muggle contraption though he knew every wire inside it courtesy of Jack's teaching. But this time, he practically tackled Darcy to answer it. She just gave him her teasing smile, shook her head in mock sorrow and hurt and mouthed, "My competition."

"MacElroy's," he drawled, turning his back on Darcy and the pub noise.

"A-Andrei?"

His stomach gave that same somersault it did the time Jack had tricked him into unknowingly eating haggis. It was Hermione on the other end, and she was either having a really bad cold or crying a bucket. He could hear her sniffling. Merlin, he wished he'd let Darcy pick up the phone. His chest constricted.

"Yes? What's wrong—?" He kept his voice steady, but he still wasn't able to speak her name.

"I—I'm sorry for bothering you, but could someone come over for a m-minute—"

"We're busy right now—"

"—my cat died."

"—I'll come."

_"What?"_ They said in unison.

"Your cat?"

"You'll come?"

"Yes, he was really getting on, you know."

"Yes, we can call Darcy's brother Drew to man the bar for a bit."

There was silence, as if they were both giving way to the other to speak after speaking at the same time thrice. Draco swallowed in frustration. But he couldn't wait to bang the phone down and leave.

"Thank you. I'm sorry for bothering you, but I—I found him just now, I thought he was just napping. I was reading all day."

"That's alright. I'm coming." He was already tugging off his apron.

She hung up. Draco gave the phone to Darcy. "Call Drew. He won't mind, right? Tell him I'll treat him next week to Dublin."

"Where are you going?"

"To Faerie Hill. Our cousin Hermione. Her cat died."

"Oh. Hermione. So that's her name."

He ignored her teasing look and nearly tore the flap off the counter as he rushed through it. Aunt Patty called something to him. "Hermione's cat died!" he answered without looking back.

A second after the door closed on him, the villagers all tittered and giggled while Aunt Patty and Kathy started the betting pool about how long it will take Andrei to get married to the new Faerie Hill princess. The Irish believed in fate, love at first sight, and a good wager after all.

* * *

They had woken up together that morning. He had flicked his tail impatiently as she fixed him his food. The usual.

She had quartered oranges and apples for herself and then ate in the living room, deep in her armchair and reading by the morning light streaming in through the open windows. When Crookshanks finished his private breakfast, he trotted over, told her by a _mrowl_ to remove the platter from _his_ rightful place, and jumped onto her lap. The usual.

He let her pet him for some chapters of the book before jumping off and sunning himself on the floor by her feet. When he was warm enough, he wound himself around her ankles thrice and then climbed the stairs for his private licking in her room. The usual.

She got lost in her book and then in her garden. She ate there outside after placing food on his dish. It was only when she went in and saw the food still untouched that she rushed to her bedroom. And there he was on his rug by her bed. Her cat for nearly ten years. Her cat who had led them to see Pettigrew's treachery. Her cat who had loved chasing gnomes, disliked loud and lazy people, adored cream cheese, hated dirty rooms. Her cat who was so much like her, who had yowled for an hour when Ron was buried and who had always leapt to Hermione's lap whenever she began to stare at the fire.

Her intelligent, prissy, loving, loyal cat, Crookshanks.

She didn't move him as yet. She let him lie there on the rug so that she'd have the memory of his image in her mind for always.

"Hey."

She jumped. It was Andrei. She didn't care even if he looked like Malfoy—or perhaps it _was_ because he looked like Malfoy, the only link she had now with the people she loved and who loved her—she hugged him, thankful that he had come and needing to hold someone. She cried a little, but quietly, as if Crookshanks was only sleeping and would be grumpy at the noise. He patted her back a bit.

He gently pushed her away and sat her downstairs on her chair. He went back upstairs, and then came down with a little box, the quilt inside it peeping out. He raised her eyebrows at her. She nodded. She opened the box. Crookshanks lay there in his favorite rug, covered with the quilt. He really looked like he was just napping.

"Thanks, Andrei." She reverently replaced the box lid.

He just looked at her, nodding. She was glad of his silence. Nothing could be said anyway. She'd felt the same way when they'd buried Ron. It was those who just kept quiet who gave her their sympathy the most.

He cleared his throat. "Do you intend to just lay him in the garden? Or do you want to take him to—?"

She smiled. "England's too far. And I'm sure he'd be indignant if I cut my vacation short. I know the perfect place. He showed it to me yesterday."

* * *

Draco sneaked glances at her as she carried the little spade, expecting her to break down and dissolve like little Ron into a puddle of tears and sobs. That was what he'd pictured, becoming one giant tissue for her as she cried for her cat. But no, here she was, quite serene, breathing deeply, looking around like they were only sightseeing, while he carried the box where her cat was about to be buried in. He knew how long she must have had this cat; he remembered the time when it was rumored throughout school that Weasley and Granger had broken up because of their rat and cat.

Still, perhaps she had become numbed by grief already. He could understand that.

They stopped in front of her grandparents' tombstones. Without preamble, she brought the spade into cutting the ground between the two graves. Her face was calm and she even smiled at him.

"He liked it here," she whispered, her skin reflecting the gold of the afternoon light.

His chest was acting up again. He needed something to do. He set the box down on the grass and took the spade from her. The ground was soft; it wasn't long before they had a good-sized hole. Hermione kissed the top of the box before placing it on the ground. She must have conjured the flowers while he dug—where else did she get such a profusion of lilies of the valley and snowdrops? And then she took the spade from him and pushed back the soil herself.

She knelt beside the flowers a little while.

"I got him in my third year at school and he wasn't quite young then. The shopkeeper said nobody wanted him." She smiled and shrugged. "My friends didn't like him at first either. I don't know why I loved him; he wasn't gorgeous like my mother's Persian, but I just felt drawn to him somehow."

Draco nodded. He kept his face impassive though her words were like wand sparks that made him want to cringe. What _was_ the matter with him? Why was Hermione Granger affecting him like this? She straightened, dusted her knees and smiled at him. He looked away.

He could see the stream lacing the hill, curving every which way like one of those dragons on Waterbut's outlandish apron. He could smell the sweet clean scent of the earth. He sensed Hermione standing beside him and gazing around as he did. He could feel his heart thudding madly in his ribcage, for all the world as if it wanted to detach itself from his body. It was all he could do not to thump his chest to calm it down. And he could hear chimes.

"Do you hear that? Sounds like chimes," Hermione asked.

"You hear it, too?" he asked, dumbfounded.

"This is the second time I heard it. Where do you suppose it comes from?"

"They say it comes from the underground palace of the faeries." He rolled his eyes. One, because he knew what he said was silly, and two, because he could have said something sensible instead but didn't say it.

She smiled. "There _are_ faeries, you know."

He looked at her. There was no mistaking the repartee in her eyes. Right. How could a wizard scoff at faeries? _Idiot, she's only suspecting you're a wizard._ He just shrugged. "It could be coming from the Tower. Have you been there?"

She shook her head.

"Do you want to go?"

She looked startled and unnerved by his invitation. He smirked inwardly. "Oh, I—I don't know—I already took so much of your time."

"Come on." And he took her hand. It took him a second to realize what he'd done, because it was like an electric current shot up his hand throughout his body, and by then it was too late. What kind of idiot would he be if he suddenly let go? He held on and led her to the top of the hill, to the ruin of the battlements.

Hermione talked as they walked. He was surprised to find her chatter pleasant. She talked about Crookshanks, not in grief, but in loving recollection, as if he was an old childhood friend. He looked at her from time to time, amazed at how she was perfectly handling this new blow.

"I know what you're thinking. I don't know why I'm so light-hearted about it either. But this isn't so sudden as—" She took a deep breath and he knew she was referring to Ron Weasley's death. "Well, Crookshanks's death wasn't unexpected at all. I guess I've already readied myself for it. It wouldn't do to grieve again. Crookshanks had had enough of that." She smiled.

She let go of his hand and read the inscription on the plaque. _" 'Here men fought for life in its purest, free and fair.'_That's poignant, isn't it? It's really wrong to mope when here we're living a life free and fair." She shrugged.

Draco just nodded, absently. His eyes were glued on the tarnished brass. What was the point of what he fought for if he wasn't living it?

"What are you thinking?" Hermione asked, her voice playful. Oh, yes, they were now pals. And know-it-all Granger was not know-it-all for nothing.

He raised his eyebrow at her, and smirked. "And why should you know what I'm thinking?"

She drew back and laughed shakily. "You really remind me of someone I know. But you can't be him. He wouldn't have been this nice to me. He wouldn't even have talked to me. Not like this anyway."

"I thought he was a _close_ friend?"

She grinned. "No, he wasn't. I only said that because I thought you were him, really. It's uncanny how you look alike. But no, we weren't friends."

"He doesn't know what he's missing, then."

Draco was startled at his own words. But he smiled because Hermione smiled. He wasn't much calmer than he looked. Inside, it was as if he had just run a mile with the five Brennan Dobermans snarling at his heels. It scared the crap out of him.

* * *

"Pins and needles."

"What?"

"You've been frozen for so long. Now that you're beginning to feel again, naturally, it's uncomfortable."

Draco snorted into his sour buttercream. "That's an understatement."

"Well, if I say you're bloody terrified—" Waterbut chuckled when Draco sputtered in denial, "—see, of course, you won't admit it. Which is why there are so many unhappy hearts around."

"I hate it when you talk like a darn greeting card."

The blue eyes only twinkled at him good-naturedly. Draco sighed. "Do you suppose this is only because she's the first one of my kind who have really been close to me after a long time?"

"Why? What do you call your aunt and cousins and neighbors? Monkeys? Robins? Trouts?"

Draco gaped at him. Waterbut chuckled.

Draco shook his head. What a stupid statement indeed. And then he choked on his drink for the second time. _Hermione Granger_, his own kind?

"Yes, that's what I noticed, dear boy. Took you a second, didn't it? Don't be shocked. You should be proud of yourself. This is proof of how far you've come since grafting yourself off from your unhealthy roots."

Draco smiled. Yes, 'Mudblood' seemed like Gobbledegook now.

* * *

_**Author's Notes**_: The short verse is borrowed from Sir Walter Scott's _Lady of the Lake. _Please review! Thank you!


	6. A total thaw

**_A Total Thaw

* * *

_**

There was buzzing in her mind. Like bees.

Hermione was curled up in her bay window, her knees to her chest, looking out at the drizzle, and at the sunlight pouring in through the drizzle, and the little rainbows arching in through the sunlight in the drizzle.

She smiled. Spring rain.

As though she had spoken her thoughts, she felt a lick in her toes.

"Hey, little girl. Are you lonesome? Are you hungry?" Hermione crooned, gently scratching her kitten behind the ears. Springrain purred. She was a delicate, silky little white thing, with eyes that changed color according to her moods. Right now they were vermillion, somehow telling Hermione that she was inclined for some milk. Hermione scooped her up and they went to the kitchen, where Hermione poured fresh milk on Crookshanks' old smaller bowl.

Springrain gave a small _meow_ of thanks, rubbed her cheek on Hermione's ankle twice, and then drank in that dainty way of hers, her little tongue not making even the tiniest splash. Hermione stroked Springrain's back absently.

_"Are you ready for a new… plaything?"_

"Andrei?"

"Yes, it's me. How are you holding up? You enjoyed it last night?"

"It was wonderful, just what I needed. And Darcy was charming."

"Right, right. Well, I'm coming over. I—that is to say, we, have something for you."

"You're always welcome."

And he had come. With a little hamper. The hamper she almost didn't notice, because Andrei's gray eyes held hers. There was something mysterious about his gray eyes. They seemed bottomless, like a lake. Ever since she had stared into those pools she never got enough of them. She remembered the glint they had when she had been alone with him in the Tower Hill. A gleam of challenge, and vulnerability. She was piqued.

And when he opened the hamper and brought out his surprise, she was worlds more than just piqued, but _touched_, in a way that made her heart pound worse than it did when he had danced with her the night before in the pub.

"Hermione?"

Kathy's voice rang through the door. Hermione felt all the blood rush to her face as if she'd been caught doing something illicit. She laughed at herself and tipped the milk carton she hadn't realized she still held to her mouth. Then she ran to get the door. Kathy breezed in holding a covered cake dish, which explained why she called instead of knocked. After placing the dish on the table, she looked down at Springrain, who had decided to sniff out the visitor, her eyes turning to their friendly aquamarine.

"Oh, hello, pretty! So you're the thing Andrei's been hiding from us when he went back from Dublin."

"Did he?" Hermione asked as nonchalantly as she could, uncovering the cake and exclaiming over it to hide her own stuff.

"Yes, he did. As if he's so clever and we're as blind as mice." Kathy winked. Hermione blushed again, but she had turned to the pantry, looking for something wholesome for her guest to drink. Jack had already banned Kathy from wine.

"You didn't grow up with him, did you?"

"No, no, we only found out about him when we read about his parents' unfortunate accident in the paper. All MacElroys in Ireland are family. The very first MacElroy was from England, too, mind. An orphaned boy. He was reared by the Fitzgeralds. He grew up and worked his way to acquiring the pub.

"Anyway, enough about Andrei's history. You can just ask him yourself. This is your very belated welcome cake, your grandmother's own recipe. Chocolate chiffon. You can share it with your lovely kitten here, or some bloke with blonde hair and gray eyes who happens to share my mother's maiden name."

Hermione laughed the remark off as she gave Kathy a glass of orange juice. "What about you?"

Kathy rolled her eyes. "Goodness, I still haven't shed the extra fifty pounds I gained since I was pregnant with Ron. I stand on the brink of getting fifty more pounds already without eating cake. I only came here to tell you about the ceili—"

_"Hermione?"_

The voices followed by knocks were familiar. Hermione gave a small cry of joy as she rushed to open the door.

Harry and Ginny stood there. Hermione only had a second to look at them though before her vision was obscured by both their manes of hair as they hugged her. Hermione smiled but pushed them back, and in swift movements, drew her wand from inside her sweater and pointed it at their feet, transfiguring their house slippers into sensible shoes just in time before Kathy opened the door wider.

"Oh, hi, Kathy!" Ginny moved to hug Kathy immediately. Harry smiled and nodded in assurance and understanding at Hermione, putting an arm around her shoulder as they went in the house.

"You're huge! My, my! And still so pretty," Kathy said, inspecting Ginny from head to toe after they had kissed each other. Ginny was wearing an emerald maternity smock over red and gold tartan capri pants. She was glowing, even though she still had the look of someone who had Apparated hastily. Hermione brushed back Ginny's long hair affectionately, and between them they exchanged a look of sisterly love.

"How have you been, Kathy? And Jack? And Patty? And…little Ron?" Harry asked, steering Ginny to sit at the table. Hermione smiled at him as she put plates on the table and sliced the cake.

"We're all fine, thank you. I'm expecting again, too. In September. How about you?"

"In July," Ginny answered, picking up Springrain and giggling when the kitten snuggled up in her lap contentedly. But before she could ask Hermione about it, Kathy spoke.

"I was just telling Hermione about the ceili. We're giving one tonight. For spring. And then we're thinking of helping Hermione set one up on her own for the summer solstice. Maude Alice used to have one every year before she took poorly, you know."

_"Tonight?_ But you just had a party last week as well!" Hermione sputtered on her juice. She was getting jittery just thinking of another party when her mind was still buzzing about the last one, and the dance she had then had been nothing more than a little swing to keep her from being crushed by the other whirling bodies on her way to the bar.

"That wasn't our real Spring Ceili yet, Hermione. We're not letting you leave with just that silly noisy jaunt. We're having better music tonight. And more food. And moonlight. We're setting up outside, by Maude's pond as usual. It's romantic. Jack proposed to me there two years ago. You're invited, of course." She smiled at Harry and Ginny.

"Oh, you can't possibly think I'll go to a party without clothes. We only dropped by. Harry had a business luncheon in Dublin." Harry nodded in agreement to Ginny's words and added, "You know, trying to earn more now. We'll come on the summer solstice. If Ginny can still move by then."

Ginny slapped Harry in the arm even as she and Kathy laughed. Hermione was, however, gaping.

"You seem to be forgetting that I'll be hosting that ceili. And I don't know how!"

"Oh, you're not to worry a bit. People will bring the food and drink. All you have to do is open your doors and make yourself beautiful for your lover."

"I don't have a lover, Kathy!" Hermione protested, half-laughing and half-blushing.

Kathy just winked on her way out. "I'll send Andrei to get you around seven."

"What am I going to wear?" she called.

"Your smile will do!" And with that, Kathy was gone.

"Is she implying I can go stark naked?" Hermione laughed.

Harry and Ginny gave her an eloquent look.

"Well, how are you two? Was it alright for you to Apparate, Ginny?"

Ginny waved a hand to say it was nothing. "We came as soon as we read your letter. Hedwig had been delayed by the windstorm. We're so sorry about Crookshanks, Hermione. Harry thought to get you another cat, but here we find someone had already beaten us to it," Ginny smirked, stroking Springrain, who still lay in her lap.

"Her name's Springrain. Andrei gave her to me," Hermione spooned some chocolate chiffon into her mouth and smiled as cake and frosting melted in her tongue.

"Andrei?" Harry asked incredulously.

"I looked that pathetic maybe. He was the one who helped me bury Crookshanks, see, so perhaps he pitied me."

She looked up to see Ginny smirking triumphantly at her husband. "That was sweet of him."

The buzz in her mind quieted for a second. She looked from Ginny to Harry and back again. "Andrei MacElroy looks uncannily like Draco Malfoy! That's a big thing not to mention to me, isn't it? Don't tell me you didn't notice! I nearly passed out when I saw him—"

Ginny giggled. "You were _that_ affected? You didn't expect Malfoy—I mean, a Malfoy look-alike—to be that handsome, did you?"

Hermione looked at them suspiciously. Unfortunately, another visitor sounded her little knocker just then, forcing her to delay her grilling of the Potters.

She opened the door. Andrei stood there. And Merlin, Malfoy or not, he _was_ handsome.

* * *

Sometimes he still wished she had never come, but at the same time, he could no longer imagine his life without her daily barging into the pub and even into the _bar_, insisting to waitress, or just chinwagging with Aunt Patty, Kathy, Jack, Darcy, and nearly everybody. She knew the regulars now, and they in turn had gotten used to seeing Hermione around, either serving beans and sandwiches, or on one of the stools, jawing with little Ron, who also preferred Hermione's arms and hip over everyone else's if she was there. Ardmore loved her. Drew had even already declared he was taken with her.

Draco turned to polish the bottles on the counter behind him and nearly jumped at seeing his own dark scowl in the mirror.

_"Do you think she'll come? Won't this be too loud for her?_

"Who?"

"Hermione, Andy. You know, the sweetest lass hereabouts at the moment, with brown hair and brown eyes, and pixie nose and—"

"I'm not planning on making a cartograph of her, Drew, and don't 'Andy' me."

"I'm taken with her. Pretty thing. And smart, by Finn."

As if he needed to be reminded of that. At that point, he had turned away from Drew and made change for a kid who ordered a beer for his dad. As soon as the kid turned from the bar, he tipped the mug to his mouth and half-ed it. Draco had stared in disbelief.

Not at the boy, but at Hermione, who stood at the door laughing, wearing a simple peach blouse and skirt. Her hair run riot in her shoulders and her eyes twinkled as she caught his eyes and waved.

It was as if she had summoned him to her side. Drew never even knew where Draco had been until Draco was back making pints, relishing the feel of having held Hermione and swayed with her in time with the music as he led her to the safety of the bar. He had deposited her on a stool and — he couldn't believe it — she had reached up and kissed his cheek, sending to him a delightful scent he had never smelled before, and making his mind reel for a second as if he'd downed a bottle of whiskey, or been clobbered by one.

He hadn't dared look at her again after that, but his shoes suffered terribly from spilled mead and wine and beer. Fortunately, Hermione had gone waitressing again, so Drew and Darcy's sniggers and teasing didn't reach her sight and hearing.

_"I need two Harps, a pint and a glass. Three Baileys and one whiskey, any bottle—it's for Mick. He's still pining for Natasha, poor guy."_

"Call me if he gets too weepy," Drew said from the other end of the bar. Hermione smiled. Draco scowled as he put her order on her tray.

"Oh, I almost forgot, the Mackenzies need a mug," she grinned at Draco. "And I need a pad, obviously."

He couldn't have stopped himself smiling as he couldn't have stopped twirling her a little while ago. Ignoring Drew's eyes drilling into the back of his scalp, he said, "What about a kitten?"

Hermione blinked. Then she laughed. "Oh, well, I'd love that if you have one handy and sweet."

He ditched Drew in their favorite pub in Dublin by Disapparating from the comfort room to Diagon Alley. With his eyes, he dared the clerk of the Menagerie to say a thing when he paid with a personal check charging the only remaining Malfoy vault which had not been sequestered, in Gringotts.

The look on _her_ face afterwards, the way her eyes shone like gems, the way she made the little cry of mixed surprise and delight, was worth every bit of his discomfort.

"Hey, dreamer, did you hear me?"

Draco jumped and his knees thunked against the cupboard door under the sink. "_Ow!_ What do you want, Kathy?" he asked, glowering at her as she giggled, her elbows leaning on the counter, her hands occupied with a cake dish.

"Grouchy because Hermione isn't here, are we? Calm down, I'll see to it that she comes to the ceili."

"I'm not being grouchy because of anyone not being here, you just gave me a fright, shrieking into my ear like that."

"You were so lost in your daydreaming you wouldn't have noticed it if I chewed on your ear. I'm bringing this to Hermione, alright? And then I'll be in Waterford to fetch the musicians. Tell Jack to bring Ron to Samuela. I'll get him from there. Can you umbrella me to the car?"

Draco flipped the flap and took the cake dish himself from his cousin. She fished an umbrella from the rack and led the way to her lorry. After placing the cake beside her on the passenger seat, he ran back to the awning and waved Kathy off.

The sun made thousands of little spectrums of light in the shower. By his feet, rainbows were flattened on the asphalt, like thinly-smeared frosting. He rolled his eyes at his thoughts, even as he smiled and jotted a note for Jack and Aunt Patty. He taped it to the counter, then ran out in the drizzle, smelling the rain, the flowers, and a scent of musk, oranges and strawberries, which he remembered as distinctly as the feel of a peach silk suit in his hands._Merlin, Andrei MacElroy. You're in a bad fix._

* * *

"What's so bad about it?"

"Don't pretend to be obtuse; it's too late for that." Draco stared moodily at his glass. Sour buttercream as usual.

Mr Waterbut sat on a stool behind the counter, reading a book with a pince-nez perched on his tall nose. He licked his thumb and forefinger and turned a page, his eyes twinkling. "Robins. Have you noticed them buzzing around lately?"

Draco rolled his eyes but nodded.

"I thought they were happy, delighted creatures, especially during spring. But no, they're actually terrified."

Draco raised his eyebrows.

"Because it is in spring that they have everything to lose. Their mates, their eggs, their very souls. But they continue. They take the risks. Fear almost always couples great joy. They go together. You hurdle the first to get hold of the latter."

"I get the message."

"Well, then, why don't you hurry along to Faerie Hill?"

_"What?"_

"You may have grown up lying, but you don't want to be a liar anymore, especially to Hermione."

"I didn't say anything about Hermione!" Draco sputtered, flushing.

Waterbut laughed so hard his book dropped to the floor with a thud; with amazing agility, he dived from his stool and caught his pince-nez before it shattered beside the book.

"Don't pretend to be oblivious, my boy. It's too late for that."

When he resurfaced over the bar, he chuckled again at the look on Draco's face. Draco knew he must be looking paler than usual. He felt as if his sour buttercream were disagreeing with his stomach juices. Waterbut shook his head and lifted the flap. He jerked his head to motion Draco to follow him.

They emerged from the back door into a meadow Draco knew would be set up with tables and chairs in a few hours. Maude's Pond reflected the trees and the sky as he approached it, pushed as he was by Waterbut. He was also made to sit down on the moss-covered rock jutting on one side of the pond like a gigantic green frog. Next, parchment, quill and ink were pressed onto his lap.

"I don't know if you enjoyed writing, but this is not a school essay and it is certainly more important and illuminating. I want you to try and siphon all your thoughts and feelings out through the quill. Sift through them that way, like an old drawer of doodahs. You may come to find something, something to take with you when you go to Hermione."

* * *

Draco was amazed at himself when he found his hand moving the quill into making line after line, until he reached the bottom of the parchment. He did find things. They were like tonics that made him less weak in the knees as he made his way to Faerie Hill Cottage.

When she opened the door, he swallowed. He couldn't understand how he seemed to have forgotten just how her eyes could hold so many golden flecks, how her cheeks plumped up as her lips turned up at the corners when she smiled. And how, always when they met, she seemed to stare into his eyes inquisitively, as if examining his soul.

"You're so early! I haven't even thought of what I would wear!" She exclaimed, totally wrongfooting him. She also kissed his cheek in that sweet and familiar manner of hers. And then he received another wrench in the gut when he saw Harry bloody Potter and his wife emerge from the kitchen.

"These are my friends, Harry and Ginny Potter. You've met before, haven't you, Andrei?"

"Oh, yeah, howdy, Andrei." Harry held out a hand, smirking.

Draco took it, taking care to smile as he tried to crush Harry's fingers.

"Alright, excuse me. There's cake, Andrei, please help yourself. I'll just go up and bathe and get dressed. I'll be quick."

She smiled at them, led Ginny to her favorite armchair, and ran up the stairs.

"Do you mind letting go now? I have yet to experience holding my child, you know."

Ginny giggled. Draco let go of Harry's hand and sank himself on the sofa beside Ginny.

"And do _you_ mind telling me what she's supposed to be dressing for?"

"Kathy said you'd pick Hermione up for the ceili."

"Oh."

"Are you alright? You look pale," Ginny said kindly.

"He'd _always_ been pale, the ferret," Harry grinned. Draco glared.

_"Harry,"_ Ginny intoned.

"Yeah, remember you owe me for disturbing my peaceful existence, Scarhead."

"Well, you seem to relish the disturbance; you even gave her a kitten, you bast—

_"Harry!"_

"—ketful of daisies," Harry finished lamely, still grinning even as he cowered from Ginny.

Ginny smiled at Draco. "We're already practicing never to say cuss words now. Fred and George are quite good at it, too. They're staying with us because they're expanding their shop yet again, but wouldn't think of living in a real house instead of a grimy den above it."

Draco nodded, rolling his eyes at Harry's persistent grin. "If Weasley could see you now…" he muttered, very quietly.

"Oh, you know he would have liked you. You avenged him, remember?" Harry whispered back.

Draco gaped at them. They were both smiling at him, almost as if they were fond of him.

It must have been walking in the drizzle. His brains had been addled.

"And besides, he wouldn't begrudge Hermione something good, especially not when he couldn't give it himself anymore," Ginny touched his arm and squeezed.

It was more than he could take at that moment. He stood up and left.

* * *

Hermione filled the ornate claw-foot tub with her favorite bubbles and then jumped in, counting the seconds. After exactly a hundred and twenty, she stood up and turned on the shower, pulling the plug as she did. Within a minute, she was pointing her wand at her hair to dry it, and slathering on cream all over at the same time.

She can't believe the way she was acting, but she just laughed it off. There could be no harm in it, could there? She liked Andrei, and his thoughtfulness, moroseness… Somehow, he made her feel less alone. A new friend, certainly. And she was thrilled by it. A lonely wren found another lonely wren and they flew off together.

She hummed, amused at her thoughts. If Ginny could perform Legilimency, the woman would be shrieking the house down. Hermione wondered what the three of them might be talking about downstairs. It was quiet.

She riffled through the contents of her wardrobe and picked an off-white halter dress. It would be perfect for the warming weather. And the satin fabric would reflect the moonlight. She searched for her plastic white camellia barrette and used it to clip the sides of her hair back. The rest fell down on her shoulders.

She sprayed on some of the perfume Ron had given her all those years ago, the bottle priceless to her, the contents magically replenished. She kissed the carven-glass rose cap and replaced the perfume in her locked velvet-lined caddy.

While she dabbed on some coral lipstick, she slipped on her white cork wedges. She twisted in front of her mirror a little, took a deep breath and went out.

She found Harry and Ginny playing with Springrain downstairs.

"Where's Andrei?"

"Oh, he… he left to help with the ceili. He said he'd come back for you later. He came too early, and you rushed off to get ready before he could say anything, that's all."

"Oh."

"You're looking great, Hermione, prettier than I've ever seen you in a very long time. Ireland's done you a world of good. Or perhaps the credit is to one particular Irishman."

Hermione had to laugh. "Honestly, Ginny, you'd think you're not Ron's sister!"

"Why? I'd certainly not think it as two-timing my dear brother. He'd have been dead five years this June. Would you like it if I said you remain an old maid for him?"

Hermione just shook her head and picked Springrain up. "I'd like some more cake. Care to join me?"

* * *

Moonlight turned even the brown dais into silver. The musicians swapped their instruments, from bongos to guitars, to clarinets to knee harps, and never slacked pace. Tables were filled to overflowing with food and drink. The Brennan sisters were doing a lively step dance, skirts and legs and spirits swinging high.

In the middle of the merriment, Hermione stood dazed by the pond, looking at the rock she had previously sat on, where she'd written to Ron.

_Ardmore Spring Ceili, Draconis Viridis_, said the little sign staked by the rock.

"The Green Dragon."

Hermione jumped. Andrei had joined her.

She smiled to cover her distraction. "Oh, you know Latin, too? You made the sign?"

"They call this stream and the pond it feeds 'the Green Dragon' because that's what it looks like. And the old Fathers wrote it down in their books as Draconis Viridis, of course, since Latin is still the language of the Catholic Church."

Hermione was more than a little jittery now. He had a different look in his eye. She had noticed it when he fetched her as well. He had barely spoken as they drove down here and when they arrived he had delivered her to Darcy and company. Now he seemed determined to talk about something. He actually steered her to the other side of the pond. It wasn't far, but amazingly, the music and noise from the band and Ardmore villagers died off as if walls had enclosed them.

"Hermione, you're not the cleverest witch in England for nothing," he began.

Hermione unconsciously clutched his arm out of shock. She stared at him open-mouthed. He swallowed and gritted his teeth, letting out breath in an impatient sigh. "I'm sorry for not admitting it to you sooner. I had good reasons for doing so. But whatever those reasons are, I realize how I've been lying to you, and I want to stop, because you've come to mean something more than just an old distant acquaintance for me."

His eyes were trained on a spot behind her, so that the gray she had admired reflected silver and hazel from the moonlight shimmering on the pond. But at that moment, Hermione felt no other feeling than resentment, and never had she felt such an itch to slap a face.

She let go of him. He looked at her with pleading in his eyes. She shook her head, her hands fists at her sides. "I need some air." Her voice sounded unlike her own. It was high and cold. "Excuse me."

She went home without knowing or caring if anyone called after her. After placing food on Springrain's dish, she went to bed fully-clothed, with her wedges still on her feet. She curled up under her blankets and stared at her side table's dovetails until the room was illumined with the sunlight of a new day.

* * *

_**Author's Note**: Ooh, cliffy! Thank you for reading, please tell me what you think, as always. This is becoming my trademark line now. *scrunchy-nose grin* _

_This was originally written for a Great Hall challenge in MNFF. The prompts said there has to be a canon character 'lost'. This character has to find help from The Green Dragon, a fictional pub mentioned in Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (or is it Quidditch Through The Ages?), said pub being run by Blenkinsop Waterbut. This entry won Second Place. Only one more chapter to go and then the sequel (rest assured though that this fic is a stand-alone). :) Please review! _


	7. Loving Life

**To Love Life Again**

Final Chapter

_**Loving Life**_

* * *

_"I…I was shocked that's all. We're infamous sworn enemies, and then you went away to England after I slapped you in front of everyone during the graduation ball. And then you came back just when I… Although it happened only recently, you've been a wonderful friend to me all the same. What makes you think I'd hate you if I knew who you really are?"_

The woman, seated on a rock by the pond, impatiently flicked her bushy brown hair back, but her expression was not impatient. Instead, it was kind and amused, her brown eyes twinkling as the man in front of her sighed and grinned nervously. He stopped tearing up the grass beside him and looked up.

"I wasn't thinking of that actually. Can you imagine the taunt all Ardmore would do if everyone gets wind that it's old Patrick now in love with Maude Alice?"

The woman wore an indignant expression before she suddenly blushed. Then she smirked. "Are you?"

"_Alphonse_ is."

"You're that anxious not to be made fun of?"

"This anxious to be right for you, is all. Thank goodness Fitzgerald is a common name."

"And thank goodness I used to hate you so much that I didn't know your second name."

"I'm so sorry for that, Maude Alice. I know how much I must have hurt you, insulting you all those years ago because of your ability."

"The past is past, Alphonse." Almost absently, she reached out and took a lock of his blonde hair and played with it, her eyes far off. "I used to think I'd do nothing else but weep after Dillon died, like my namesake, but I learned from her instead. Maude could have been happy forever if she didn't choose despair over her faerie lover's devotion. I'd rather have the happiness."

"With me?"

"Not necessarily, but yes, if you ask."

Hermione opened her eyes and winced at the glare of the sunlight. She had never before drawn her curtains at night, because she always woke up early. But now it was noon. She could feel a lightness in her head brought by sleeping just when the sun was rising, and she could feel Springrain fretting beside her, walking up and down the bed,_meow_ing pitifully for food.

"Sorry, doll," she whispered, stroking the kitten. She pointed her wand at the door. After a second, a can of cat food breezed in. Hermione opened it with the key attached. Springrain jumped down from the bed as Hermione leaned over and placed the food on the floor.

She watched Springrain eating, willing her mind to stay blank. But it wouldn't. With a sigh, she pointed her wand at the windows. The drapes swung shut. In the gloom that descended, she recalled her dream. Her grandparents.

And she recalled Andrei.

No, Draco.

She left her bed, kicked off her wedges and changed into a shirt and jeans. She began to pace, staring at the millions of dust motes suspended in the shaft of sunlight slicing the dimness of the room from a gap in the curtains.

She didn't know how long she carried on like this, but when she threw open the drapes at last, it was to the mellow light of an afternoon fast approaching evening. The birds were calling sweet things to each other like friends making last-minute exchanges before going home, and Hermione breathed in the salty, clean scent of the air, not quite standing at her window, but bathed in its light.

Springrain was _meow_ing again. With a laugh, Hermione picked her up. "I'm starving, too!"

* * *

"Where have you been off to? Did you and Andrei have a spat so soon? And on a ceili, too! You both just disappeared last night," Aunt Patty said without preamble, as soon as Hermione was within earshot from the bar. The regulars were at their tables, making no effort to hide their indulgent smiles and titters.

"You don't look good," Darcy whispered. Kathy laid a hand on Hermione's forehead.

"I will probably faint if you go on gossiping about me instead of giving me food and drink," Hermione replied, snappily enough that everyone left her alone, at least until she finished the tuna and steak sandwiches Kathy served her. Jack was on one table with a laptop, and judging by the number eleven on his forehead, he was deep in MacElroys' books and not liking the submersion. That left Draco presumably upstairs or somewhere with little Ron. She drank her Chardonnay as if it was water, but it did nothing to quell the hyperactive doings of her stomach.

When Darcy came over to refill her glass, Hermione shook her head and covered her glass with her palm. "I'll just have water now, Darcy."

Darcy was encouraged with Hermione's honeyed tone. She poured Hermione some Perrier and then lifted the flap and sat beside Hermione, giving her a nudge, hip to hip.

"Tell me what happened then?"

"Do you know my grandparents?"

Darcy looked surprised and disappointed but nodded just the same. "Oh, Maude Alice. Of course. Everyone loved her. But she moved off to England, you know."

She looked around; Kathy and Aunt Patty were peering in from Jack's shoulder at the laptop over in the other side of the pub, fussing.

"I don't know if Patty or Kathy has told you, them being related to Alphonse after all, but he used to be Patrick around here, and he used to torment Maude Alice in their younger days, it was quite the village stir whenever they fought and Patrick was quite the village black sheep because of it. And then his family moved to England when his mother remarried. When he came back, he was all different, and introduced himself to everyone as Alphonse, his second name.

"Maude Alice was in mourning then, because Dillon Connor, who could have been your grandfather instead, died of heart disease. It was so sudden; they never even knew he was ill. Anyway, this new Alphonse began to see what Maude Alice really was, and unsurprisingly fell in love, and then he snatched her away from us to England, none of us getting wind that he was the same Patrick Alphonse Fitzgerald who was Maude Alice's sworn enemy until Maude Alice herself spilt the fact when she had too much mead on the ceili the spring after they were married."

Hermione laughed right along with Darcy at the end of her long tale, but her stomach was all the more in a frenzy then. And she felt light-headed. Probably from the several glasses of wine Darcy had tried to loosen her tongue with.

"So, where's Andrei?"

Hermione raised her eyebrows in what she hoped was detachment and not surprise at being asked the question. "I—I was just about to ask you that. I've last seen him last night at the ceili."

Darcy shrugged, gave Hermione a pat on the shoulder and went back to the bar. "I thought he was probably still passed out on your cottage stoop, as the men hereabouts do after they'd had a drink to drown out an argument with their fair ladies."

* * *

He was gone. Where did he go? Surely he wouldn't leave his family here just because she decided to take some time off before talking to him, so that she wouldn't have to break any of his bones? And yet, now knowing who he was, perhaps he was in England now, sulking and cursing and calling her all the pretty old names he used to hurl at her—

She shook her head and came to a stop at the edge of Maude's Pond. It did look like the head of a dragon. And the stream that fed it, the stream that looped from there to her hill like a gigantic, tangled ribbon was like a symbol of her inner turmoil.

"Are you _still_ in turmoil, really? Or are you just being intractable?"

Hermione whirled around, and if it weren't for the man's quickness in getting hold of her arm she would have known how it was to land in an Irish pond in early spring dusk.

He had brown hair and blue eyes, such piercing cobalt-blue eyes that spewed sparks as if Hermione had done him some grave wrong, when he was the one who had made her nearly jump out of her skin and be soaked in a pond besides.

"Pardon me, but I don't know you. Good evening to you," she managed to say cordially, before turning away…and almost walking into him.

Her surroundings were beginning to spin before her eyes but in spite of this confusion, she could hear distinctly: chimes.

"Learn from your grandmother, and from the stream before you, a stream formed by a foolish woman's tears. She loved dearly, but she was foolish nonetheless. Unlike your grandmother, who was wise. Learn from _her_. I am nearing my end, and I am getting impatient. So there, colleen."

Hermione frowned, at the words and at her hazy vision. But then the chimes began to fade, replaced by the call of the various birds and nocturnal creatures stirring, and then everything became clear and still again. She swayed, steadied herself, and found herself alone.

* * *

She didn't bother to retrieve her rental Volvo at MacElroys', but walked all the way up to her cottage, finding it calming after her strange encounter with that blue-eyed man. The dusk was deepening, pink turning into lilac and lilac turning into navy, and stars starting to appear. She looked up at the sky, feeling no confusion at all, but frustration because Draco was nowhere just when she wanted to talk to him and get everything over with.

And yet, she couldn't help remembering, he had been there when she needed him most.

Something white winged through the horizon. Hermione quickened her pace. Hedwig hated to be kept waiting.

When she finally made it upstairs, she saw the white owl perched on her table eyeing the white kitten pacing in Hermione's bed. Springrain paused every now and then to imitate Hedwig's stare, head cocked to one side and unblinking. Hermione laughed. Hedwig glared at her.

"So you've met. Hedwig, this is Springrain." She picked up the kitten and nuzzled it, to show Harry's owl that it was special to her, not to be harmed. "Springrain, this is Hedwig." Likewise, she stroked Hedwig, showing her kitten that this was a friend. "Be nice to each other since you're both snowies."

Hedwig held out her leg, blinking at Springrain in recognition. Springrain _meow_ed once and flopped down on the floor, licking her front paws in an endearing way.

Hermione sat between them and unfolded the note and recognized Ginny's hasty handwriting, the strokes long and sharp and billowy.

_"Hermione,_

We've been looking after your library as you asked. I can't believe the books you inherited from Professor Dumbledore! If Minerva could see them now, she'd be green with envy. I remember the books were divided between the two of you, but still…Merlin!

Anyway, while I was doing routine dusting, this book fell at my feet. (And I had to Floo Mum for some pain-relieving potion afterward, mind you). It has no title, and it is in chirography. You know what I'm talking about. You'll have to conjure it, because Hedwig protested bringing such a weight, and Harry, too, of course. You know he loves his owl.

The book dropped on its spine (no damage at all, I assure you) and opened, and when you've just been nailed by a book, you can't help but stare at the words while you're waiting for someone to pull it off of you. So I saw something in it about your Blenkinsop Waterbut, page seven thousand forty-nine. I'm dumbfounded, to say the least. If this is your Waterbut as well—it's not quite a common name after all, is it?

Okay, gotta go now, the pot's screaming. Will write again soon.

Love, Ginny."

Hermione had a hand over her mouth. When her amazement was past, she took her wand from where she hid it in one leg of her jeans and conjured the book. It landed on her bedroom's carpet with a thud. Springrain and Hedwig both jumped.

The cover was old, battered black leather and as Ginny had said, bore no marks at all that suggested what it contained: no other than the unpublished autobiography of the greatest headmaster Hogwarts had ever had.

She riffled the pages nippily but gently, until she came to page seven thousand forty-nine.

Her eyes zoomed from side to side down Dumbledore's neat and compact script.

_"…Nicholas told me a very interesting story, a sidelight that led him to persist in Alchemy. He was in China at that time and looking into the ancient Chinese elixirs. Going down the steep hill from a sanctuary, he chanced upon an inn, which had an English name, surprisingly enough: the Green Dragon. Nicholas was weary and at the end of his tether, because he was getting nowhere in his scheme and he'd just received an owl from Perenelle telling him to go home and just let her be._

He entered the place, and asked for a drink. The publican introduced himself as Blenkinsop Waterbut. I don't know if this is indeed his name, or my dear Nicholas was just in a temper while recalling this. Blenkinsop was candid enough to say how foolish Nicholas was. I could imagine Nicholas breathing fire at that.

After quite an exchange I won't repeat in this recount because even though I am not intending this for publication it is always wise to think of the future and of children, Nicholas left the Green Dragon, all the more determined to save Perenelle. He succeeded of course, and became known as the master of Alchemy. The consequence of this was that when I sought him, I had a hard time looking for his Secret-Keeper, an introverted woodcutter who spoke only to the oyster mushrooms. It took a great deal of magic to transform into one, and then I had to be clever not to terrify him to death when I spoke.

Nicholas and I agreed the Philosopher's Stone needed to be destroyed. But I agreed to keep it for him for some time and see if we could indeed keep it. All this discussion after I have resumed my human form (which required the help of some potions Perenelle cooked up handily). And then Nicholas told me about Blenkinsop Waterbut, half-laughing, half in tears."

Hermione closed the book before she passed out. China! And Nicholas Flamel, who had made the Philosopher's Stone hundreds of years ago!

So Mr Waterbut _did_ live chiliads.

And he was not a wizard at all, certainly.

And she met him again awhile ago, in his true form.

* * *

She weeded the garden beds every week, getting lost in picking flowers for hours at a time, so that when she went in the house, either Springrain would be _mrowl_ing moodily or black smoke coming from the kitchen would greet her.

She'd bought a new stack of books from Waterford and Dublin on her trip there with Kathy and Darcy, in which they also shopped for clothes and some very girly baby things though it was still too early and Kathy had barely begun to show. Afterward, Hermione's legs were cramped for an hour, but she relished it.

The cottage also looked new, because she'd had its exterior repainted, turning the white walls into cream, and the fading yellow trim into green. The villagers approved, and had brought her cake and cookies, welcoming her anew as if painting the house was a symbol of her officially moving in.

Perhaps she was.

She had already sent a resignation letter each to St. Mungo's and the Ministry departments she was involved in.

And here she was scrubbing and polishing and dusting, preparing her house for guests for the Summer Solstice Ceili.

She found it a little surreal, not being entrenched in work or anything. But she liked it, simply living for herself, playing with her cat, taking care of her blooms—all of which she knew now, down to how much water each variety preferred—and reading Muggle and Wizarding literature, merely for pleasure.

_She was content and happy and could ask for nothing more._

But she wasn't being completely truthful about that.

* * *

Aunt Patty was grilling Molly over the latter's pumpkin pie recipe. Kathy and Ginny had their heads together on the sofa, giggling every now and then and throwing amused looks at their husbands, who were among the men guzzling down wine and beer near one of the tables. The only rose among them was Darcy, drinking as enthusiastically, but deep in conversation with Charlie. Fred and George were far apart from everyone else, and seemed to be talking to someone, or maybe testing a new product on that unsuspecting someone. Merlin, she only hoped they'd be quick with the Memory Charm. She had long ago given up trying to rein them in with their stuff. Besides, she was too high-strung with worrying if someone might fall down from being poisoned by her cooking. She had made a ham, a cake, a stew, and platters of finger foods.

But everyone seemed to be enjoying, spilling out of the house in pairs and groups, dancing or talking. Remus and Tonks were among the couples, as well as her parents and Hagrid and Madame Maxime (who were still being ogled at by some children). It was quite a reunion. And she was touched at how quick they were to come and see her.

The sky was torn between day and night, giving just enough light to make the hill glow. She'd wanted to set up at the pond, feeling like undoing the negative atmosphere she had undoubtedly left there, but Aunt Patty had insisted that wouldn't be right. Summer solstice should always be celebrated in Faerie Hill. Hermione agreed. She stopped fussing about and walked through the people, accepting compliments on her cooking and on her dress, a simple frock in silver silk, held up by a slender satin ribbon on her left shoulder. She walked until she left the ceili behind. She reached a lofty point and looking back, she was enchanted at how pretty the gathering was, all those smiling people, lit by the moonlight looking like nymphs and—

"May I have this dance, please?"

She smiled and turned around, allowing him to place his hands on her waist and turn her. The music still reached them, and along with it, that tinkle of chimes.

"Where have you been?"

"Have you been looking for me then?"

"Not particularly."

"I've been at the Green Dragon, just mulling things over until he kicked me out."

"You're not referring to Blenkinsop Waterbut, are you?" "I'm sorry if I—"

"Yes, him." "No, I'm glad you left."

They were quiet after speaking again that way in unison twice.

"I knew you'd say that."

"Yes, quite. I needed to…live for myself without…You see, ever since I came to Hogwarts, I've had goals and purposes. When the war finished and Ron died, I felt like there's nothing left for me to live for. Silly, isn't it?"

"Yes, quite. It's silly how you sound like you've been practicing this speech for a while now, maybe to your cat or in front of a mirror."

Hermione's lips twitched, but she pulled in her smile. "I have. And as I said, I needed some air. I was stunned. Though I've had suspicion of it for ages, it still hit my stomach. I'm actually related, even if only distantly and only by marriage, to _the ferret!_ And if I hadn't left you, or if you went after me, I would have jinxed you into oblivion or broken your perfect nose. I still feel inclined to, actually."

"Really?" he asked, letting go of her waist and distancing himself in mock alarm.

"You enjoyed making a fool of me, didn't you?"

"I was the one who always felt like a fool, as a matter of fact."

Perhaps the musicians took a break to eat. It was silent, with only that distinctive and musical _cling cling cling cling_that seemed to come from underneath the hill itself, but surrounding them, resonating like a bird's song. Hermione looked at Draco, trying to see the old nemesis she had in school, but she couldn't picture that boy anymore. Instead, there was only Andrei, who had sung a silly sweet song to an infant, who had taken her to the Tower Hill, quiet but offering sympathy, who had given her a kitten, a new plaything so she wouldn't get melancholy in the cottage.

She smiled at him.

* * *

Draco sighed as quietly as he could as he looked at her smiling at him. His heart was doing that trick again, hammering like mad in his ribcage. He could hear the chimes and they quickened, too, as if to keep pace with his lunatic cardiac muscle.

"You mistrusted me, perhaps? That was a deliberate insult—" Her smile was gone for now.

"It's not that, Hermione—"

"—seeing as you know I would have been glad to see you again! You never gave me a chance to thank you for avenging Ron's murderer yourself," she said quietly and sighed. "I could still feel the sting of your hand on my arm, when you saved me from the ignominy of murdering that woman."

He got hold of her shoulder and squeezed.

"Merlin, you think I want to be thanked for killing my own aunt? As for everything else, I already said I'm sorry, what else should I say?"

"That you are falling in love with her?"

Hermione gave a small cry of surprise and Draco cursed and blushed.

The tinkle of chimes had risen to a crescendo and there beside them had appeared a young man with brown hair and blue eyes.

"Who are you, pardon?" Draco asked in forced calm.

He felt Hermione touch him on the arm. "Blenkinsop Waterbut, I presume, sir?" Draco gaped at her, and then at the man, who smiled, revealing too perfect white teeth.

"Only half right, madam," the man answered, taking Hermione's hand and kissing it. "My name is Niall. Lord Niall of the Faeries, over whose tower we are right now standing."

_"What?"_ Draco exclaimed, quite loudly, because the chimes were still ringing.

"What?" Hermione asked Draco, her eyes still on Niall.

"He's Maude's faerie lover, in the legend," Draco answered.

"Whom she spurned, yes, and truly," Niall said. "But I've learned my lesson, and with my atonement, I have done."

At this, five women—faeries they must be, whose beautiful faces glowed like the moon—rose out of the ground beside Niall, and embraced and kissed him. Draco found himself squinting because of the dazzling sparkle of diamonds on their hair, ears, neck and wrists.

"And these are my daughters, Blesilda, Encanta, Kintana and Sopia. And my own, my precious, Lilias."

Beside Draco, Hermione made a small and breathless _'Oh'._ The chimes had gone diminuendo. The faerie women were smiling at them, arm in arm with Niall.

"We have a stricter code for our magic than you do. We are punished when we curse out of spite. You know what I did to Maude. And so I was cast into your world, until the time came for me to conduct the Green Dragon. A thousand souls I needed to exhort or make happy before I could return to my own lands.

"Since you two are the last, and quite the closest to my own…past sufferance," he smiled, "I want to leave you a remembrance."

Niall reached into the collar of his gleaming indigo robes and pulled out a tiny vial on a chain around his neck. He pulled it over his head, joined Draco's and Hermione's hands together, and pressed it onto their palms.

"That bottle contains Maude's tears. Tears of love which I had once begged to be given me, that was why I wore it around my neck. But now, I have love already. I don't need those tears."

He kissed Lilias gently, the chimes rang around again like a storm, and then they were gone, leaving behind a scent of musk, heady and sweet, and the vial, which turned into a diamond as big as a pebble, scintillating in the spring night.

Draco let out a small laugh. Hermione's mouth was open. He nudged it closed. "So where were we before we were rather rudely interrupted?"

"Don't be facetious," she said, still breathless, staring at the diamond in her palm.

"I'm not facetious. Delirious, is all." He smiled. And he still hadn't removed his hand from her chin. She batted it away, blushing.

"About what?"

"Faeries popping out of the ground and leaving us a diamond that could buy half of Waterford, girls in the ceili wearing low necklines, my cousin finally thinking of getting a babysitter, and my other particular 'cousin' being friends with me. Plenty reason enough." He looked back at the ceili as he spoke, and sat down on the grass. He almost didn't sound like himself. Seeing that Lord Niall had loosened his tongue, more than likely.

Hermione joined him, giving him another whiff of that delightful scent she wore. "When we're alone like this—"

She stopped mid-sentence as the silence resounded with his neck cracking as he turned to look at her. She laughed. He rubbed his neck.

"When we're alone like this, do I call you Andrei or Draco, _cousin_?"

"Do you wear shoes you hate if you can help it?"

"No." And she nodded in understanding.

"I'm ashamed of most of my past. And everything I'm ashamed of stemmed from actions triggered by my old name. There's no way I'd think of using it again especially now when—"

"When what?"

He looked away. He couldn't be thinking what he was thinking. Yet he was. He grinned and shrugged. "Oh, you know, I might share it with somebody else. Someone undeserving of being tainted."

"Oh, I see."

He turned to her and stared into those chocolate brown eyes. "Just so you know, that's all."

When her face began to glow pink, he looked away.

They stayed like that for some moments, the crickets and tree frogs filling in the silence.

"Look at me," she suddenly whispered.

He obeyed, not feeling any other inclination anyway. Her cheeks were still glowing and in that silver dress, she looked like a faerie herself, and more beautiful than Lilias or the other four. Down at the ceili, the musicians had reassembled, and were playing a lovely slow tune on their fiddles and flutes.

"You've made a new life for yourself. I'm proud of you and…thankful of you. MacElroy is a good name. It suits you." Her smile turned mischievous and she imitated his shrug. "And it will suit whoever you'll want to share it with, I'm sure."

It was a good moment to kiss her, and he did, briefly and gently.

She smiled, and together, they went back to the ceili.

* * *

A/N: This novelette can stand alone. I have a 'sequel'. Not continuing this storyline (it's over and done!), but the setting, the characters. 13 chapters ready to be uploaded. :) However, I'm moving my Dramione stuff to Hawthorn and Vine and will be updating there (and in MNFF) only. Those of you who are serious with the quality of your Dramione, I recommend that site. Thank you for reading! Please review, if you would.


End file.
